Comment by nvahalik

I mean, is there an objective understanding of hate? Of love? Of porn, of art, of dangerous speech, of democracy, or capitalism? There's objective elements, sure, but AFAIK the only things with complete objective definitions are those defined in code, as they have a complete definition that doesn't require (additional) human subjectivity. Whether those definitions are correct is an question on top of that.

Poetic indulgence aside, any understanding is going to complex (made up of multiple component concepts, which are likely to be complex themselves) and nuanced (without clean, precise English definitions). Some elements will be more objective, others more subjective. It's the world, it's messy, that's how there's things.

Yadda yadda, I suspect we'll get a more "objective" understanding as fairness research in neural nets continues (it's super cool and you should go check it out).

Isn't everyone's authority ultimately themselves? You either hold it yourself, or choose to invest it (whole cloth or piece wise) in something or someone else; either way, the first and last decision is yours.

That all said, there's pretty clearly a set of observed experiences (from slavery to George Floyd to red line districts and food deserts) and a theory to explain those observations (racism; personal, structural and systemic).