Biases serve a human purpose: Grant AI some slack too

Heuristics help humans survive data overloads. Instead of AI free of all bias, let's aim for minimal harm

- RAHUL MATTHAN

We often think of bias as a flaw that needs to be purged. It's not. It's a cognitive shortcut that we need to fine-tune. We are constantly bombarded by shapes, colours, sounds and smells. Even though the human sensory system can collect this information at a rate of approximately 10 million bits per second, our conscious mind can only process 50 bits of information per second. That we are such a successful species, even though we can only process 0.0005% of all the data we collect, is a testament to our brain's ability to quickly sort the important from the trivial.

We do this using heuristics, simple rules of thumb that help us decide which information to prioritize based on context, experience and human evolutionary adaptations. This is how we can tell, just from its colour and appearance, that we should not put something in our mouth. It's how we know a dangerous neighbourhood the moment we enter it, even if we have never been there before. When we hear something rustling in the dark, that fight-or-flight response we instantly feel is because, at some time in humanity's past, that sound indicated the presence of a predator.