more on Why's a Retired Army Lieutenant Colonel on the"No-Fly" List?]

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: "Lin, Herb" <HLin () nas edu>
Date: February 27, 2006 11:57:42 AM EST
To: dave () farber net, ip () v2 listbox com
Cc: krulwich () yahoo com
Subject: RE: [IP] mo Why's a Retired Army Lieutenant Colonel on  
the"No-Fly" List?]

We all concur that there will be false positives and false negatives
with any system.

But the POLICY issue is how choose to deal with the false positives -
the innocent people mistakenly put on the no-fly list.  If the
government provides no way to get relief from such a mistake, it's a
statement that as a national policy, we are willing to let innocent
people suffer from such a mistake in the name of protecting us all.

THAT means that it's a matter of HOW MANY innocent people will suffer in
pursuit of that goal.

Those who object to the current No-Fly list arrangements believe that
the government is not doing enough to minimize that number, even
granting a legitimate desire to protect the public.

Herb




-----Original Message-----
From: Dave Farber [mailto:dave () farber net]
Sent: Monday, February 27, 2006 6:34 AM
To: ip () v2 listbox com
Subject: [IP] mo Why's a Retired Army Lieutenant Colonel on the"No-Fly"
List?]



-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [IP] Why's a Retired Army Lieutenant Colonel on the"No-Fly"
List?
Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2006 23:13:35 -0800 (PST)
From: Krulwich <krulwich () yahoo com>
Reply-To: krulwich () yahoo com
To: dave () farber net

Dave, this is the wrong criticism.  Scientifically, from the perspective
of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning (my PhD area), any good
methodology that attempts to inductively generalize from a sample set to
predictions of future set membership, or to deductively generalize from
a set of criteria describing a sample set to predictions of future set
membership, is going to have false positives and false negatives.  Any
methodology that had zero false positives and false negatives would be
so limited as to be useless.

To put this in non-scientific terms, the only way to 100% avoid false
identifications is to have the system so limited as to be useless, like
saying "suspect someone only if they're carrying fuse wire and muttering
'allah akbhar' under their breath."  On the other hand, the only way to
100% avoid missing anyone is to have the system so broad that it's
useless because it suspects everyone, like saying "suspect everyone
unless they're wearing a purple heart and have had their picture on TV
shaking the President's hand."
Any system that attempts to do something intelligent will inherently
have some mistakes in both directions.

That said, there are clear ways to evaluate such methodologies.  What
percentage of predicted group memberships are clearly wrong?  What
percentage of obvious examples that should be suspected are in fact
suspected?

But finding one example, even a prominent example, is scientifically not
a reason to reject a methodology.

--Bruce


--- Dave Farber <dave () farber net> wrote:

> http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat?pid=63406
>
> The federal officials who are busy assuring Americans that they've got

> their act together when it comes to managing port security are not
> inspiring much confidence with their approach to airline security.
>
> When Dr. Robert Johnson, a heart surgeon who did his active duty with
> the U.S. Army Reserve before being honorably discharged with the rank
> of Lieutenant Colonel, arrived at the Syracuse airport near his home
> in upstate New York last month for a flight to Florida, he was told he

> could not travel.
>
> Why? Johnson was told that his name had been added to the federal
"no-fly"
> list as a possible terror suspect.
>
> Johnson, who served in the military during the time of the first Gulf
> War and then came home to serve as northern New York's first
> board-certified thoracic surgeon and an active member of the community

> in his hometown of Sackets Harbor, is not a terror suspect. But he is
> an outspoken critic of the war in Iraq, who mounted a scrappy campaign

> for Congress as the Democratic challenger to Republican Representative

> John McHugh in 2004 and who plans to challenge McHugh again in upstate

> New York's sprawling 23rd District.
>
> Johnson, who eventually made it onto the flight to Florida, is angry.
>
> And, like a growing number of war critics whose names have ended up on

> "no-fly" lists - some of them prominent, many of them merely concerned

> citizens - he wants some answers.
>
> ...
>
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