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Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

nytimes.com

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Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#201

Post by madengr »

cloudwalking wrote: post #138
treebeard901 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The classification of cryptography as munitions was an interesting choice. The first amendment may protect domestic encryption capabilities as stated by the wikipedia article. From a legal standpoint, does encryption being classified as munitions also put it into second amendment territory? As information becomes weaponized, it's an interesting thought. The first amendment is arguably more vulnerable these days, so I…

It does not, because the 2nd amendment protects arms, not munitions (for example, bombs).

What's the difference? The 2A certainly applies to cannons. Are those arms or munitions? Grenades are legal to own, just need the tax stamp.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#202

Post by maxxxxx »

chimen wrote: post #177
maxxxxx wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we would be fine with a smaller military. Nobody is talking about completely stopping military expenditures. The question is whether it really needs to be as big as it is right now.

Overturning so many regimes in petrol filled countries is a messy business. I think a big chunk of the spending goes to intelligence and misinformation.

Personally I think a big chunk goes to not well thought out missions like Syria, Afghanistan or Iraq. It seems nobody is willing to admit that there is no path to winning or ending things so they just keep going and spending a lot of money and energy. And the defense contractors are certainly happy with this.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#203

Post by kachurovskiy »

plandis wrote: post #178
smokeyj wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> but maybe that just means I’m just a no-good warmongering fool, right? More specifically, a warmongering fool who can't discern a false dichotomy - because your options in life are rarely ever drones vs more lethal drones. These regions we're using drones in. They could probably use more tools to enable true democratic representation. Isn't that what Google should be doing, given that they "don't do evil"? Building…

Id argue it's not a false dichotomy because drone strikes will go on regardless of what Google does. It's very clear that whatever collateral damage drones currently cause is an acceptable cost to the militaries using them.

"go on regardless" argument can be used to justify absolutely anything so I don't think it helps advancing the meaningful debate.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#204

Post by IAmEveryone »

vowelless wrote: post #3

On one hand, I reluctantly appreciate Trump's election because it will force silicon valley to think many times before readily giving up user privacy to the US government. I felt like the attitude was very lax under Obama (despite the Snowden revelations). On the other hand, this bothers me a bit because it continues to allow people in the valley to maintain a (sorry to use this word) delusion that what they are doin…

> allow people in the valley to maintain a (sorry to use this word) delusion that what they are doing is "moral"

People refusing to work on military technology isn't "appearing moral". It's just "moral", at least if you consider war to be generally amoral.

People here and elsewhere have been throwing the term "virtue signalling" around a lot in the last year or so. This is a perfect counterexample: Google employees speaking out against military tech are shouldering the risk of appearing disloyal to their employer. If Google were to cut their military ties, they would forgo whatever benefit they previously sought in that relationship.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#205

Post by komali2 »

pacala wrote: post #131
komali2 wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you, and I want to make a "times change" argument. This is my perspective, because I read too much scifi: I can conceive of a couple possibilities in 300 years. 1. Humanity is gone or stone-aged. Either because it failed to colonize before being wiped out by disease, because it nuked itself, or because it implemented AI in a way that got itself killed. 2. Humanity has turned peaceful, formed a global community…

> Either because it failed to colonize before being wiped out by disease, because it nuked itself, or because it implemented AI in a way that got itself killed. If the probability of a kind of disaster is sufficient to blow up Earth, it is likely that the same kind of disaster will blow up all the handful of colonies we can hope to build. At astronomic scale, the speed of light is quite slow.

Potentially. I think the possibility of quarantine is much higher between planets, though.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#206

Post by rdtsc »

tc313 wrote: post #140
treebeard901 wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The classification of cryptography as munitions was an interesting choice. The first amendment may protect domestic encryption capabilities as stated by the wikipedia article. From a legal standpoint, does encryption being classified as munitions also put it into second amendment territory? As information becomes weaponized, it's an interesting thought. The first amendment is arguably more vulnerable these days, so I…

IANAL but I’m pretty sure the second amendment only applies to guns; you can’t walk around with an RPG on your shoulder.

It depends how you look at it. What was the purpose. Presumably after fighting in the Revolutionary War the goal was not to give people hunting privileges, they had something else in mind. From that point of view, maybe RPGs should be allowed, but so should attack helicopters, surveillance capabilities, private spy satellites, etc.

> IANAL but I’m pretty sure the second amendment only applies to guns; you can’t walk around with an RPG on your shoulder.

Surprisingly perhaps you can buy a military grade flamethrower complete with a napalm package: https://throwflame.com/ it's not even classified as a firearm, and is illegal in only two states I think.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#207

Post by olavk »

fastball wrote: post #147
ixtli wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing the degree to which people are ignorant of what you've said here and imagine the US was motivated by ideology.

The US was motivated by ideology. Why was the US an ally of GB/France/etc and not Germany/Italy? Contrary to your belief, greed can be ideological -- striving for global free trade is an example of this.

Germany declared war on the US, not the other way around.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#208

Post by dragonwriter »

fastball wrote: post #147
ixtli wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's amazing the degree to which people are ignorant of what you've said here and imagine the US was motivated by ideology.

The US was motivated by ideology. Why was the US an ally of GB/France/etc and not Germany/Italy? Contrary to your belief, greed can be ideological -- striving for global free trade is an example of this.

> The US was motivated by ideology.

Well, certainly, the Roosevelt Administration was, but they were (prior to Pearl Harbor) also forced to maintain an outward pretense of neutrality while backing the Allies, because a large part of the rest of the US was also motivated by ideology...to either be sympathetic to the Axis Powers (one large, well-bankrolled faction) or to be opposed to intervention (another large, well-bankrolled faction, that often worked together with the preceding one against any interventionist policy.)

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#209

Post by walshemj »

robert_foss wrote: post #22

As an engineer I have serious moral qualms about furthering the goals of any military. Contributing means being complicit. The fact that the military funds research doesn't change that.

That's fair enough but you have to decide if your cool with that and resign if you have moral beliefs that run counter to your employers

You come across as wanting that sweet sv $ and benefits without having to make any moral choices - if you got to work for CNI company's you know what the deal is.

And before you ask yes I did face that at my first job when I analysed some high speed film from one experiment and though oh I know what that "objct" is and my office mates said yes that's probably REDACTED.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#210

Post by sseth »

Darthy wrote: post #183
sseth wrote: post #135

Do we really want to test a theory that we can have a repeat of the 1930s when the democracies fell far behind an autocratic regime in the arms race, and again the autocratic regimes will not win? Democracies are in retreat around the world, and I only hope we wake up before it is too late. The military-industrial complex may have become far bigger and perhaps in some ways a burden, but the world is a dangerous place…

> Democracies are in retreat around the world Nope. Not even in the slightest. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Waves_of_democracy.png https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_democracy#Waves_of_...

The graph you are linking to ends in 1998, when Bill Clinton was in power, the US was the sole superpower, the EU was increasing in size, China's GDP was a tenth of what it is now, and i think Boris Yeltsin was running Russia, and most people had not heard of Osama bin laden. I think it is safe to say the world is different now.

Look at the backsliding in Turkey, Phillipines, Burma, Venezuela, Egypt. Look at the regimes which have come to power in Hungary, Poland. And of course Russia itself. China, which at one time seemed to be heading for more moderation has taken a sharply authoritarian turn. I would argue just in the last five years things have turned sharply for the worse.

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