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The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

arstechnica.co.uk

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Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#151

Post by CWuestefeld »

arca_vorago wrote: post #112
hodwik wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a military. All states do -- its part of their duty to their citizenry. The problem in the US is that our hippy-run academia are driving the smart people out of jobs in the military (and police force for that matter), and it's putting us in a terrible position. The only way to fix it is for smart people to start joining the military again.

This is absolute bullshit. The problem is that we need a military that is actually going to man the fuck up when an O-5+ decides to push some unconstitutional program on the people. What has happened isnt that hippy academia is jacking up the military, but rather that the military has been kicking out the kind of people who arent afraid to tell truth to power, and are increasingly making choices and then only hiring…

allowing the neocons to push us into wars for dubious reasons

It seems to me that it was some group other than neocons that got us inveigled in war in Libya and Syria - thereby creating the fertile spawning ground for ISIS.

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#152

Post by qrendel »

Aeolos wrote: post #2

"Obliterated a wedding because people where celebrating by shooting in the air." This is the definition of evil. How and why is the Pakistani government allowing this program to operate within their territories?

Among other reasons, Pakistan security forces receive a lot of military aid from the US State Dept, including weapons and materials (e.g. bulletproof limousines) used by the same Pakistani officials for their own protection. I expect US support also helps as a deterrent in their problems with India as well.

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#153

Post by vonmoltke »

dalke wrote: post #113
hodwik wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need a military. All states do -- its part of their duty to their citizenry. The problem in the US is that our hippy-run academia are driving the smart people out of jobs in the military (and police force for that matter), and it's putting us in a terrible position. The only way to fix it is for smart people to start joining the military again.

Costa Rica doesn't have a military. (See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_without_arme... .) How has that country failed in its duty to the citizenry?

Correction: Costa Rica has no standing army. They have a gendarmarie and other paramilitary forces organized under the Fuerza Pública (Public Force). To say they have no military is not accurate.

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#154

Post by logfromblammo »

pc86 wrote: post #144
alanwatts wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're still thinking in terms of 19th century paper-based processes when you attempt to estimate globally integrated wealth in terms of a nationally fragmented paper-based information system ($). Also, GDP is not indicative of net wealth, as it is a measurement which implicitly asserts the broken window fallacy. Over the long term, breaking down these legacy barriers to trade and freedom of movement would necessaril…

Please try to make your points without quoting random people. Quotes are not sources, they are not facts, they're just something someone said.

Quotes do have the notable advantage of still being remembered and recognized many years after their original utterance or publication. This is often because they are a more concise and eloquent expression of a particular thought than the people repeating the quotes can manage themselves on short notice.

And they have the additional rhetorical impact of appeal to authority. While this does nothing to establish the validity of facts, it works wonders with garnering emotional support from your audience.

Don't fall into the trap of arguing with rhetoric. That's bringing a knife to a gunfight. The Internet is not a formal debate forum. The audience is filled with humans, not robots. Sometimes, if your goal is to sway people to a particular point of view, or even just to force them to acknowledge that other points of view exist, it is easier to take rhetorical shortcuts. Saying "that's cheating" doesn't help. We all know it's cheating. We just don't care, because it allowed the point to be expressed in a quicker, more entertaining way.

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#155

Post by ehudla »

pwg wrote: post #25
Houshalter wrote: post #7

They literally named it Skynet. They have an evil sense of humor. Actually using machine learning to detect terrorists isn't a terrible idea. But you are going to get an error rate, and probably a high one in the noisy real world. Maybe only 50% of the people you detect are actually terrorists. Maybe it's even worse than that. We can't even test it because there is no validation set and unreliable labels. The reasona…

> But you are going to get an error rate, and probably a high one in the noisy real world. ... The reasonable thing to do with that information, would be to surveil them further It is even worse than that. Due to the base rate fallacy ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Base_rate_fallacy ) the 'machine' is going to have a huge false positive rate, so without that additional surveillance, most will not be guilty of what t…

People interested in these issues should read the position paper written by Jeff Jonas and Jim Harper in 2006, "Effective Counterterrorism and the Limited Role of Predictive Data Mining".

http://www.cato.org/publications/policy-analysis/effective-c...

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#156

Post by [deleted] »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #103
Houshalter wrote: post #7

They literally named it Skynet. They have an evil sense of humor. Actually using machine learning to detect terrorists isn't a terrible idea. But you are going to get an error rate, and probably a high one in the noisy real world. Maybe only 50% of the people you detect are actually terrorists. Maybe it's even worse than that. We can't even test it because there is no validation set and unreliable labels. The reasona…

A drone strike typically kills identified terrorist targets but also unidentified targets. The trick is that as long as bystanding casualities (also children yes - or as the drone operators call them "fun sized terrorists") have not been identified they're automatically counted as terrorists. (see also https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/ ) I don't think now that the beast has been unleashed it can be controlled or…

[deleted]

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#157

Post by rdancer »

avar wrote: post #37
rdancer wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have nukes. They could easily institute a defense doctrine of nuclear retaliation tomorrow, and the terror would stop. But the reason they don't is that they are bought and paid for, both as a country via foreign aid and as individual government members via bribes (or "speaker fees", as you guys call those now).

Let's run with that thought. Let's say Pakistan committed to using nukes in retaliation for US drones shooting their citizens, what are they going to shoot at exactly? They're supposedly developing longer-range capability capable of hitting some of Europe[1], but right now they might be able to hit some US military bases in the middle-east[2]. I'm not saying Pakistan isn't corrupt, but pretending that they could simp…

You are right. I haven't considered that. They only care about the standoff with India, so it makes sense that their range only about covers her.

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#158

Post by gambiting »

rayiner wrote: post #133
random_upvoter wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reading discussions on drone strikes makes you wonder what ever happened to pacifism. This whole idea that you can just go around other countries killing people -- even if they intend on killing you, and even if you would be able to hit the right target 100% of the time-- it's just old. It's primitive. And that is not to blame the USA. At this point in history humanity, as a collective, has the maturity of an 11 year…

I don't see why pacifism is "more evolved." Violence is one of the most fundamental interactions between organisms, right up there with eating and sexual reproduction. Is eating "primitive?" Are you looking forward to a future where humans "evolve" out of needing to eat? Throughout history, prosperous and successful societies have been built on the back of military power (Egypt, Rome, Great Britain).

"Are you looking forward to a future where humans "evolve" out of needing to eat? " Actually yes, absolutely!

Don't get me wrong, I love eating as well as cooking, but I have to agree that a stupid amount of time is spent on doing those things. If I could switch to a solution where I take a pill and it provides my body with all possible nutrition then I would in an instant.

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#159

Post by rdancer »

DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #103
Houshalter wrote: post #7

They literally named it Skynet. They have an evil sense of humor. Actually using machine learning to detect terrorists isn't a terrible idea. But you are going to get an error rate, and probably a high one in the noisy real world. Maybe only 50% of the people you detect are actually terrorists. Maybe it's even worse than that. We can't even test it because there is no validation set and unreliable labels. The reasona…

A drone strike typically kills identified terrorist targets but also unidentified targets. The trick is that as long as bystanding casualities (also children yes - or as the drone operators call them "fun sized terrorists") have not been identified they're automatically counted as terrorists. (see also https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/ ) I don't think now that the beast has been unleashed it can be controlled or…

It took one executive order to start this, it will take one executive order to stop it. The election is in a year's time. Make your vote count!

Re: The NSA’s machine learning algorithm may be killing thousands of innocent people

#160

Post by abecedarius »

hodwik wrote: post #104
DyslexicAtheist wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A drone strike typically kills identified terrorist targets but also unidentified targets. The trick is that as long as bystanding casualities (also children yes - or as the drone operators call them "fun sized terrorists") have not been identified they're automatically counted as terrorists. (see also https://theintercept.com/drone-papers/ ) I don't think now that the beast has been unleashed it can be controlled or…

We need a military. All states do -- its part of their duty to their citizenry. The problem in the US is that our hippy-run academia are driving the smart people out of jobs in the military (and police force for that matter), and it's putting us in a terrible position. The only way to fix it is for smart people to start joining the military again.

We, if you mean the U.S., once considered a large standing army a hallmark of tyranny: e.g. http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_12s6.... is George Washington needing to argue "yet a few Troops, under certain circumstances, are not only safe, but indispensably necessary".

How we got from there to over a third of the total world military spending, well, it's a long story, and I don't know what to do, but I don't think encouraging more smart people to join up will help the most.

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