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The human isn't there to check the computer's work; the human is there to look for overriding special-case circumstances the computer can't understand, i.e. executing act-utilitarianism where the computer on its own would be executing rule-utilitarianism.

Usually, in any case where a bureaucracy could generate a Kafkaesque nightmare scenario, just forcing a human being to actually decide whether to implement the computer's decision or not (rather than having their job be "do whatever the computer tells you"), will remove the Kafkaesque-ness. (This is, in fact, the whole reason we have courts: to put a human—a judge—in the critical path for applying criminal law to people.)



I never disagreed with the idea that humans should be involved. I was concerned about the use of "responsible".

Let's be specific who you're comparing a judge to though. A guard, social worker, or bureaucrat with the guard being most likely. A guard probably has a lot of things to do on any given day, administrative exercises would only be part of them. The same could be said of a social worker. This is why I cautioned against making someone who is likely underpaid and doesn't have much time capital "responsible" for something as important as how long someone stays in the system.




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