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Cathy O'Neil

Founder & CEO, ORCAA · 1 appearance on the record.

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Cathy O'Neil is the author of Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy, examining algorithmic bias. A former quantitative analyst at D. E. Shaw and Barnard College academic, she founded the consulting firm ORCAA to audit algorithms for fairness and opacity.

5statements → 0claims → 0claims resolved → 3.75/5average certainty → 2.75/5average debate potential → 5said about them ↓

1 opinion · 4 insights · every statement was checked. none of them is a claim the record can settle: opinions, insights and disclosures never carry an assessment.

Everything Cathy O'Neil said on the MAD Podcast that made the record, most notable first. Filter by type, assessment or year in the ledger →

Opinion
O'Neil: Data science is a war of moneyed interests against vulnerable people
“I think of data science as And the general modelization of everything in sight, including education, including getting a job insurance, health, it's a war. And we're losing. Like we are, this is a war of the people who have money and can go hire data scientist…”
Cathy O'Neil Dec 5, 2013 ▶ 37:10 Panel Discussion // Data Driven #16 // May 2013
Insight
Cathy O'Neil: Data scientists must reject roles that treat them as implementers
“When mathematicians ask me how do you become a data scientist, I give them a lot of advice, but one piece of advice I have is if you interview with a business who thinks that you're an implementer and not a business person, then don't take that job.”
Cathy O'Neil Dec 5, 2013 ▶ 58:18 Panel discussion // Data Driven NYC #12 // Jan 2013
Insight
O'Neil: Data problems that bypass feature selection will not yield financial returns
“Feature selection is always gonna be very important. If you have something that's so easy to answer that you don't have to care about feature selection, you're not gonna make any money doing it.”
Cathy O'Neil Dec 5, 2013 ▶ 52:50 Panel Discussion // Data Driven #16 // May 2013
Insight
Cathy O'Neil: Bad data science stems from using algorithms without understanding them
“I think a lot of bad data science happens because people are like, I don't really know how this algorithm works. I'm hoping when I press this button, something good comes out. And look, it converged, so it must be okay.”
Cathy O'Neil Dec 5, 2013 ▶ 6:13 Panel Discussion // Data Driven #16 // May 2013
Insight
O'Neil: The hardest data science role is conveying fundamental uncertainty
“The hardest role you have with data scientists, and this is when you get the label negative, is when you're saying, we actually don't know the answer to this, and you don't either, and no one knows the answer, and we can't pretend to know the answer.”
Cathy O'Neil Dec 5, 2013 ▶ 50:35 Panel Discussion // Data Driven #16 // May 2013

The other half of the tape: Cathy O'Neil's own voice is left out of every number here. Other people bring the name up 5 times in 3 episodes on the MAD Podcast. every mention, with the transcript →

Who brings them up most Natalie Evans-Harris 2Gary Marcus 2Rachel Schutt 1

Every mention by year

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011201420152016201720182019episodes it came up in
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2019 2 mentions in 1 episode
2018 2 mentions in 1 episode
2014 1 mention in 1 episode

Appearances (1)

EpisodeDateSpeaking time
Panel Discussion // Data Driven #16 // May 2013 Dec 5, 2013 7m

Played on the show (1)

Episodes where a recording of Cathy O'Neil was played rather than Cathy taking part, or where the tape carries an address with nobody putting questions to them. Listed because the words are on the record, kept out of every score on this page because they were not said on this show. We read this off the tape: who was spoken to, who was asked something, who answered whom.

EpisodeDateOn tapeWhat it is
Panel discussion // Data Driven NYC #12 // Jan 2013 Dec 5, 2013 1m clip played
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