This page is dedicated to sharing the books I’ve read that I think people interested in data science and tech ethics and behavioral economics, and a variety of related things, will also find interesting.
Data and Tech Bias
Weapons of Math Destruction by Cathy O’Neil (Crown, 2016)
This is a fascinating look at how misuse of data science, and not thinking about consequences, can have devastating impacts on real people’s real lives. See complete review on Medium.
Invisible Women by Caroline Criado Perez (Abrams Press, 2021)
An excellent expose of the many ways data and technology are used to exclude women and favor men, from smart phones comfortable to men only to snow-plowing schedules that led to preventable injuries to women.
Algorithms of Oppression by Safiya Umoja Noble (New York University Press, 2018)
A book about the shocking behavior of “neutral” search engines around hate, the damage they can do, and the absolute lack of responsibility the tech world is taking for making it better.
Race After Technology by Ruha Benjamin (Polity Press, 2019)
An exploration of the many ways that technology is used against people of color to prop up white supremacy and further long-standing social inequity, despite long promises of technological neutrality.
Data Science Ethics
Human-Centered Data Science (The MIT Press, 2022)
This is a good overview of the many ways we can make Data Science more ethical and human-focused so we don’t do harm and best understand the needs of people, communicate with them more effectively, and actually do good.
Data Science Ethics by David Martens (Oxford University Press, 2022)
A really good dive into ethics in data science, with a nice focus on privacy from several perspectives. Introduces mathematical ways to measure privacy and other ethics-related metrics.
Human Behavior
Talking to Strangers by Malcom Gladwell (Back Bay Books, 2021)
A book that will interest those fascinated by human behavior. We are way overconfident in our abilities to read other people. See complete review on Medium.
Weird by Olga Khazan (Hachette Books, 2020)
A unique look at being an outsider in a social world. Moves from the pain of being weird to the advantages it can bring to how to live weird and finally to the choice of trying to conform to some degree or not.
Ascent of the A-Word by Geoffrey Nunberg (PublicAffairs, 2012)
This is an engaging exploration of “assholism,” with a nod to other vulgar words and labels, starting with a history of the concept but soon moving on to the behavior of people labeled assholes over the last several decades.