Q1:  The US and Germany seem to differ regarding business bribery.  Explain,
preferably in a single sentence.

A:  It is illegal for a US company to engage in bribery.  In Germany, it
is condoned in the sense that it is deductible from the firm's income
tax.

Q2:  A student said in class that the author of our reading on bioethics
seemed to be biased.  Preferbly ia short sentence, explain his basis for
that assertion.

A:  The author seemed to give more space to the pro-abortion arguments
than the anti-abortion ones.

Q3:  In our reading on energy usage in training machine learning models,
what is the role of hyperparameters in the heavy consumption of energy
resources?  Three sentences should be plenty here.

A:  An ML algorithm must be "tuned" by setting hyperparameters,
finding the best combination of them.  Since the number of possible
combinations that we try is huge, that results in huge energy usage.

Q4:  In class we talked about two terms "disparate treatment" and
"disperate impact".

      (a)  We also talked about a legal term, "similarly situated."  Did
      that third term relate to the "two disparates"?  Explain.

      (b)  In our discussion of the lawsuit opposing Harvard's
      affirmative action admissions policy, we noted that
      Asian-Americans tend to major in STEM fields.  How did that relate
      to the "two disparates"?

(Please label the subparts of your answer, (a) and (b).) 

A(a):  Yes, if two people are similar in all respects but something like
race, gender or age, they are "similar situated," so if they are treated
differently, it is disparate treatment.

A(b):  Harvard, as a liberal arts school, cannot admit too many STEM
majors.  Since Asian-American applicants disproportionately wish to
major in STEM, more of them will be rejected.  This is disparate impact.

Q5:  In the class discussion of the McWhorter article, there was an
example given of a linguistics professor who was using expertise to
analyze gender bias in this case. In one or two short sentences, state
the professor's claim and how was it shown to be wrong.

A:  In the 2016 presidential election, Hillary Clinton was commonly
referred to by her first name, but Donald Trump was referred to by his
surname.  The professor said this was sexist, but then someone pointed
out that another candidate, Bernie Sanders, a man, was referred to as
Bernie.

Q6:  How did the FDA change clinical trial regulations following the
revelation that thalidomide caused birth defects? How did that change
affect the sleeping medication Ambien?

A:  After the thalidomide tragedy, the FDA banned the inclusion of women
in early-stage clinical trials in an effort to avoid the possibility of
experimental drugs affecting unborn babies.  So when the ban was lifted
in 1993 after years of drugs being approved that were understudied in women,
the Ambien dosage was too high for women.