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Software Used To Predict Who Might Kill
eldavojohn writes "Richard Berk, a University of Pennsylvania criminologist, has worked with authorities to develop a software tool that predicts who will commit homicide. I could not find any papers published on this topic by Berk, nor any site stating what specific Bayesian /
decision tree algorithm /
neural net is being implemented." From the article: "The tool works by plugging 30 to 40 variables into a computerized checklist, which in turn produces a score associated with future lethality. 'You can imagine the indicators that might incline someone toward violence: youth; having committed a serious crime at an early age; being a man rather than a woman, and so on. Each, by itself, probably isn't going to make a person pull the trigger. But put them all together and you've got a perfect storm of forces for violence,' Berk said. Asked which, if any, indicators stood out as reliable predicators of homicide, Berk pointed to one in particular: youthful exposure to violence." The software is to enter clinical trials next spring in the Philadelphia probation department. Its intent is to serve as a kind of triage: to let probation caseworkers concentrate most of their effort on the former offenders most likely to be most dangerous.
Their probation officer pays more attention to them, and they feel trapped in the system. They can't move on and contribute positively, and lash out violently.
Thanks, that helps.
"70% confident this man will commit murder" = 30% are definately not murderers who will be discriminated against as being a high risk murderer.
"95% confident this man will commit murder" = 5% are definately not murderers who will be discriminated against as being an EXTREMELY high risk murderer.
Stop invalid scientific research. Ask your local scientists to feed their lab rats with a phytoestrogen-free chow.
...the attempt to solve with technology what can't be solved by technology.
How about having social workers that deserve that job title? Do we soon replace all judgment on humans and human interaction with computers'?
It is this very dehumanization that causes violence among humans in the first place. How long until someone is flagged by this and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because he feels trapped?
This whole anti-social project shouldn't even have started. What a waste.
Of course it runs NetBSD. BTC: 1NT7QvbetmANwaMzhpVL6
Hey, that's a psychological classics. If the reply is 'I have no idea, there must be something missing in the story' the person asked have thinking homicidal deviations.
However if the first thing that comes to her/his mind is 'It's clear, she killed her sister in order to be at another funeral so she could meet the guy again' then there is higher possibility that there could be something wrong with the asked person.
I'm not insane. My mother had me tested.
I was thinking that: my gf works for the local probation service and they use a software package that gives them a risk score of some sort based on the offender's history.
usa and russia were fed the same propaganda, have pretty much the same level of stupid nationalism, a comparable gap between rich and pood, high crime rates, anything-goes capitalism, and until about two years ago even the same currency.
that's why i live in the eu.
Conservatism: The fear that somewhere, somehow, someone you think is your inferior is being treated as your equal.
"Forecasting Dangerous Inmate Misconduct:" The great thing about forecasting is you can make a living off being completely wrong. Perhaps they should start forecasting if the criminal forecasters will do better than the weather forecasters. This makes me wonder: which is more profitable - forecasting criminal behaviour or forecasting stock prices?
Well since I was making Hurricane forecasts by July of 2006 that said the season was essentially over for the USA... (Not bragging just I did) The forecasting of events really isn't a hard or difficult thing. In the case of prisoners, you would do better to give a small reward system for accuracy and do a survey system similar to Iowa Prediction Markets. (do your own lookup) It is often a reality that we can predict who is going to steal the most or who is going to kill and quite accurately.
Having worked in a prison as RN, I know pretty well what is going on with the crime scene. It isn't a mystery. The domestic ignorance of what is causing crime, and how to deal with it is mostly the problem. People really just don't like the factor set being told. So I will just to get some really low moderation (by telling the truth) tell approximately what is the profile of violent criminals.
A violent criminal usually falls either below 85 IQ or above 185 IQ. The frequency of this below IQ 85 is about 85% of the population of such persons with about 13% above IQ 185. Only a tiny fraction falls in the middle. Essentially a person who is violent is one who cannot adapt to their world due to low mental state and who rashly reacts to situations they are unable to handle. The very bright criminals of this type are in fact vicious cunning predators. The unique and common link of both groups is their unwillingness to defer gratification of desires for extended periods of time. The want something now and they demand it now and they get it now. They brush anything out of their way on the way including other human beings. If this profile matches to the behavior of some other groups of people we all know and love (CEO's) It isn't an accident. They fall out of this group as well. Essentially we have a party who is willing to force the system rather than work with it. This profile does have racial components. Certain (Nameless deliberately -- I am not suicidal) racial groups tend to do this more than others by wide margins. You could just as well determine these people by their credit rating. It would be just as accurate or more so than the networks.
Actually the most uniform behavior seen in prison is that the persons are ones who "flunked out of kindergarten." The reality here is that successful anti-crime programs generally teach people to defer gratification and to do things like saying those 3 magic words, "Please" and "Thank you." I know this sound simple. It really is. The Church of Scientology (I am not a member and don't intend to be one) has a very successful program that teaches this sort of stuff. It empties prisons when tried. The reality is that when people are taught how to actually deal with their desires and how to communicate with others and how to handle situations, most of them actually do so. This is a damning statement against our modern public schools who think that such teaching is not their duty. Frankly it is their only duty.
Never Politically Correct ~ I prefer the facts If you don't like what I say, get a life, or comment yourself.
The technique used in the paper breaks prisoners into two groups: about 20% of them are tagged as likely to engage in misconduct, and about 80% of them are tagged as unlikely. Then about 20 people from each group (representing 10% of the misconduct group, but only 2.5% of the unlikely group) wind up doing something especially bad-guy-like in the next two years. So it's much better than flipping a coin, which would put 500 people in each group, and would be more inaccurate and more expensive. (Because higher security for 500 people is more expensive than higher security for 200 people.)
Of course, it kind of sucks for the 180 people who aren't going to do something bad-guy-like who are stuck in the misconduct pool. But that number gets winnowed as technique gets better, which is what this research is about.
So: what if you know that you have all the contra indicators: black male youth, poor background, divorced parents, ...
Why bother to do anything: you can't get credit (you are going to be a criminal - right ?), you can't get to be an apprentice or into a good college (you are going to be a criminal - right ?), ...
I can see this happening. Be scared, real scared!