“Just” accuracy? Procedural fairness demands explainability in AI‑based medical resource allocation

AI and Society:1-12 (2022)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

The increasing application of artificial intelligence (AI) to healthcare raises both hope and ethical concerns. Some advanced machine learning methods provide accurate clinical predictions at the expense of a significant lack of explainability. Alex John London has defended that accuracy is a more important value than explainability in AI medicine. In this article, we locate the trade-off between accurate performance and explainable algorithms in the context of distributive justice. We acknowledge that accuracy is cardinal from outcome-oriented justice because it helps to maximize patients’ benefits and optimizes limited resources. However, we claim that the opaqueness of the algorithmic black box and its absence of explainability threatens core commitments of procedural fairness such as accountability, avoidance of bias, and transparency. To illustrate this, we discuss liver transplantation as a case of critical medical resources in which the lack of explainability in AI-based allocation algorithms is procedurally unfair. Finally, we provide a number of ethical recommendations for when considering the use of unexplainable algorithms in the distribution of health-related resources.

Other Versions

No versions found

Similar books and articles

Explainability, Public Reason, and Medical Artificial Intelligence.Michael Da Silva - 2023 - Ethical Theory and Moral Practice 26 (5):743-762.

Analytics

Added to PP
2022-12-26

Downloads
379 (#63,367)

6 months
185 (#22,400)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author Profiles

Janet Rodriguez
University of Puerto Rico
David Rodríguez
Colegio Mayor de Nuestra Señora del Rosario
Txetxu Ausin
Spanish National Research Council (CSIC)
1 more

References found in this work

The idea of justice.Amartya Sen - 2009 - Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
Utilitarianism.J. S. Mill - 1861 - Oxford University Press UK. Edited by Roger Crisp.
An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation.Jeremy Bentham - 1780 - New York: Dover Publications. Edited by J. H. Burns & H. L. A. Hart.

View all 30 references / Add more references