Anti-discrimination laws are totally blind to AI bias because they require a human to blame, and there isn't one.
March 24, 2026
Original Paper
Antidiscrimination Law’s Cybernetic Black Hole
SSRN · 6397518
The Takeaway
The paper identifies a 'cybernetic black hole' in legal doctrine where machines and humans together create discriminatory outcomes that the law cannot see. Because current legal assumptions require an identifiable 'responsible actor' or a specific practice, standard lawsuits are structurally incapable of stopping modern, complex systems of bias.
From the abstract
Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets. Our American systems addressing employment, housing, family regulation, welfare, and others overwhelmingly generate discriminatory outcomes. Into these existing discriminatory institutions, we have increasingly incorporated machines, creating discriminatory cybernetic systems composed of humans, machines, and organizations. This Article reveals how these cybernetic systems have created black holes in antidiscrimination law, discrimin