Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project • Hacker News Board

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

#621

Post by bmelton » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:36 PM UTC

ApolloFortyNine wrote: post #229

tc313 wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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

How it's written I personally think you should be able to buy any weapon available on the open market. Or at least any weapon that could realistically be used by an infantryman (as the wording is "A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State,." I'd rather have a new amendment then have judges be able to decide what the definition of arms is. Slippery slope. They really could one day decid…

Broadly speaking, that's been the holding of the courts since 1939.

U.S. v. Miller loosely established the test (later solidified in 2008's Heller v DC) that weapons commonly used in militia service are inherently deserving of second amendment protections.

Miller, a known mobster who was caught with a sawed off shotgun lost his case because

a) the military testified that they had never used sawed off shotguns, so they were not useful to a military, ergo a militia (which was a lie -- they had used them, and found them useful for trench-clearing)

b) Miller's attorney was not very good, and didn't even challenge that testimony, much less so by totally disproving it -- I offer a little sympathy here as they didn't have Google at the time

Also noteworthy, Miller was actually dead when the decision came down, as he'd been murdered, and because /shrug, the trial kept going, but the defense (for obvious reasons) quit trying. He was sentenced in absentia.

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

#622

Post by bigbluedots » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:36 PM UTC

IAmEveryone wrote: post #214

jcwayne wrote: post #165

Serious question for those who agree with this petition. Which country's military would you like to see be the most technologically advanced in 20 years?

I'd vote for Belgium. More seriously: the US has nuclear weapons, rendering them safe from any direct confrontation with enemies challenging them technologically. They have a conventional military 10x the size needed for the sort of intervention that actually succeeded in the past (the Balkans, the first Gulf war). The rather unsuccessful wars (Afghanistan, Iraq) were lost not for technological reasons or any other d…

It is probably hard to convince people of the benefits of democracy while killing those people, inadvertently or otherwise.

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

#623

Post by cjhanks » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:37 PM UTC

So it is ethical to track hundreds of millions of people to manipulate them for profit. But unethical to defend power plants in the United States?

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

#624

Post by deciplex » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:37 PM UTC

chrisseaton wrote: post #575

kiliantics wrote: post #484

And this is why tech workers need to unionise. This petition is a weak statement that probably will have no effect. Unless these workers could pose a real threat to Google by threatening a strike action, Google has no need to change anything. Furthermore, if the workers really stood by their moral convictions, they'd use their collective power to tackle the issue more directly than by just appealing to Google. Compan…

> A union at Google could threaten to effectively halt all institutional operations of governments or other companies in order to influence their actions. But this seems an amoral thing to do, to me! A small group of unelected, unaccountable and non-diverse people abusing their relative power to try to force a democratically elected government or private company to do something? Why would anyone want that?

This post seems like it was probably sarcasm but I can't tell. Just in case, though: we already have that.

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

#625

Post by teen » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:38 PM UTC

adsgjlnionio wrote: post #608

IAmEveryone wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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 s…

Do you think the US should stop developing military technology? I doubt it, and I doubt many Google employees do, either. I doubt they would be happy to live in a world where the U.S. has a weaker military than countries like China or Russia. I also doubt they would approve of throwing out our advanced targeting technology in favor of Vietnam-style carpet bombing. They are uncomfortable with killing people even thoug…

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

#626

Post by samirillian » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:38 PM UTC

larkeith wrote: post #561

> In an interview in November, Mr. Schmidt acknowledged “a general concern in the tech community of somehow the military-industrial complex using their stuff to kill people incorrectly, if you will.” He said he served on the board in part “to at least allow for communications to occur” and suggested that the military would “use this technology to help keep the country safe.” I have a sneaking suspicion that Mr. Schmi…

That is some menacing language. What exactly is the right way to kill a person.

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

#627

Post by hardly_a_mirage » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:38 PM UTC

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 because of corruption and failings of its leaders, people are losing faith in the democratic process. Not because their militaries aren't powerful enough.

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

#628

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:38 PM UTC

grellas wrote: post #533

Where does one draw a line these days among the personal, the moral, the legal, and the political? The military application in question is legal and is approved by a duly elected government that supports it politically. In earlier days, employees generally would see this as just doing their jobs in developing technology that their employers wanted developed and would not concern themselves about ultimate uses and app…

[deleted]

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

#629

Post by deciplex » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:40 PM UTC

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…

It's not clear to me that America is not on the path that Germany was headed down in the early 30s.

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

#630

Post by samirillian » Wed, Apr 04, 2018, 11:40 PM UTC

rahulmehta95 wrote: post #14

This may be an uncomfortable fact but people have surprisingly short memories: the military funded the majority of the early advances in systems, networking, and cryptography (and especially as a large part of the latter subject area, invested heavily in fundamental, theoretical research). Not saying that I disagree with the employees' opinion, just that DoD/Pentagon involvement in artificial intelligence research sh…

As Carl Jung might say, just because a thing has base origins, it doesn't mean that it has to be a base thing. Google should not shrug and say "from violence we came to violence we will return." I'm moved by the people speaking out, as much as I am disappointed to hear of Mr. Schmidt's involvement with the Pentagon.