Both Uses

bias
in
Gulliver's Travels
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Now your honour is to know, that these judges are persons appointed to decide all controversies of property, as well as for the trial of criminals, and picked out from the most dexterous lawyers, who are grown old or lazy; and having been biassed all their lives against truth and equity, lie under such a fatal necessity of favouring fraud, perjury, and oppression, that I have known some of them refuse a large bribe from the side where justice lay, rather than injure the faculty, by doing any thing unbecoming their nature or their office.†
Chpt 4
For, indeed, who is there alive that will not be swayed by his bias and partiality to the place of his birth?†
Chpt 4 *

bias = a personal preference; or any tendency to move in a particular direction

Definitions:

(1) (bias)
a tendency to favor one side -- in people, a prejudice that affects fair judgment; more generally, any built-in lean to move or behave in a particular way (like a car that pulls right)
(2) (meaning too rare to warrant focus)
Specialized meanings of bias include:
- statistics: any of several errors that distort results
- textiles: a line or fold that is diagonal relative to the sides or grain of the fabric
- electronics: a steady-state current that is forced through an electronic device