Formal Definition and Fairness in Regulations

Definition

Before proceeding with specific examples and techniques, we need to specify fairness more formally. We already know the intuitive definition; however, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, fairness is:

The quality of treating people equally or in a way that is right or reasonable

According to Mehrabi et al. (2021)Mehrabi, N., Morstatter, F., Saxena, N., Lerman, K., & Galstyan, A. (2021). A survey on bias and fairness in machine learning. ACM Comput. Surv., 54 (6):

The absence of any prejudice or favoritism toward an individual or a group based on their inherent or acquired characteristics.

So, things are simple: Just treat everyone equally, and it will be okay. However, important details can be often overlooked. Understanding terms equally can be very different for different people. We will see examples of this later in the course.