Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B • Hacker News Board

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#261

Post by neotek » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:31 AM UTC

80386 wrote: post #36

pstuart wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not everything, but to deny its role in shaping the world is unreasonable. The War on Drugs is behind this mess. The cartel was born out of this, and MS-13 was a result of that, our "justice" system. This doesn't make cartel or MS-13 members innocents, but it's not like they came from a vacuum.

Does that mean Americans deserve to be subject to the cartels and MS-13?

Nobody* deserves to be the subject of violence but at some point Americans need to take responsibility for creating (and continuing to create) the environment in which cartels can flourish.

When almost half the country can't even be bothered voting, much less stand up against crimes against humanity like forcibly and intentionally separating children from their parents (sometimes permanently) and locking them in cages, then frankly I think you lose the right to complain about the circumstances you find yourself in.

In other words, you can't take a shit on the kitchen counter and then complain about the smell.

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#262

Post by api » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:32 AM UTC

rmilejczz wrote: post #98

_iyig wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>So - while I would prefer a "monitored solution" to border control over physical imposing measures, my real preference would be for us to all work toward eliminating these national-level borders completely. You sound like someone with the ability to live anywhere, who consequently has little stake in their current "somewhere." Lots of Americans (and people in other countries) don't have this flexibility. They are di…

Sad that you make almost no effort to push responsibility on the people hiring undocumented workers

This needs to be repeated often. If you want to stop illegal immigration, arrest those who employ illegals. A few business owners spending the night in jail, being charged with felonies, and facing huge legal fees and fines will have a large chilling effect. If there are no under the table tax free jobs to be had, the flow of migrants will diminish quite a bit.

Here's a thought: make those who employ illegals liable for back taxes and back wages at US minimum wage. That will hurt.

Or is that already the case? If it is the law is not being enforced at all.

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#263

Post by mjamil » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:33 AM UTC

gonational wrote: post #144

rmilejczz wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All I’m saying is that it’s appalling to see all of these “solutions” almost completely ignore the root problem and instead become obsessed with “border security”. Our borders are secure, immigration is not a threat to your life, the problem is almost purely economic and I think that is the more fruitful discussion I meant no particular offense to you, I see this sentiment regularly in online forums and repeated thro…

> immigration is not a threat to your life My wife and I have both been hit by illegal immigrants. One of them driving drunk and drinking in the car while he hit me, and had no insurance or license, and had a prior DUI that he missed court for. The other (one that hit my wife’s car) simply didn’t have insurance, but wasn’t drinking. My wife’s car had to be repaired heavily (over $5,000), which was paid for by our ins…

That’s awful. I’m sorry that happened to you. But I’m not sure I understand your argument. If one or both of these drivers were legally in the US, what would law enforcement do differently? From my reading of your situation, it sounds like you had the misfortune of twice encountering under-insured drivers, and had to deal with the consequences. How did you make the (il)logical jump from that to, “Illegal immigration harms people?” It sounds like a causal logical fallacy to me, but I’d appreciate being corrected if you think I’m wrong.

Some general problems your situation unintentionally alludes to (not perhaps in your state, but common in the south) are criminalizing the issuance of drivers licenses to undocumented people (which literally prevents them from obtaining insurance), and the fact that these people are working in the shadows and thus being underpaid (and thus not being able to pay for insurance).

The problem of under-insured drivers (estimated about 13% of all drivers) is real. Many folks have proposed ways to quantify and address the problem (e.g., [1]).

[1] https://www.naic.org/cipr_topics/topic_uninsured_motorists.h...

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#264

Post by barry-cotter » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:34 AM UTC

tensor wrote: post #183

paggle wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Name one country with better-than-average standard of living that has opened its borders and thrived. There will always be a wall around something nice — either around your house, or your neighborhood, or your country.

Canada takes in a large number of immigrants and thrives for it. Based https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_net_migra... , we take in double what the US does.

This is completely unresponsive to the comment you’re replying to. Canada is extremely far from having open borders, controls temporary and permanent immigration vigorously and doesn’t border any poor countries anywhere with substance populations.

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#265

Post by barry-cotter » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:39 AM UTC

ndarwincorn wrote: post #249

barry-cotter wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He didn’t make an economic argument, he made a social and political one about changes to culture. I support open borders for the same reason I support free trade but the idea that it would be anything but massively disruptive to most existing political settlements is a joke. The US fifty years after open borders would have a lot in common with before but the Roman Empire had a lot in common with the Republic too. No…

Borders are an authoritarian tool of control, so allusions to empire and talking about a democratic society with a safety net being unable to handle open borders is bizarre to say the least. The entire point of the argument is that in aggregate the benefits outweigh the costs, not that it's costless.

> The entire point of the argument is that in aggregate the benefits outweigh the costs, not that it's costless.

True, if you don’t have the concept of community. If you do you value fellow members differently than non-members. From a net human welfare perspective the conquest and settlement of the Americas was pretty great. More people, richer people, healthier people, more educated people. Not so great for the people and peoples who were there before 1492 though.

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#266

Post by neotek » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:39 AM UTC

_iyig wrote: post #226

Faark wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We've seen what happens when other countries adopt wholesale open borders policies. [..AfD] You make it sound like there was an actual negative impacts. I haven't seen much "horrible" data on that front. It certainly gives ammo to fearmongers, but how does this make it a less good goal to strive for?

You mean besides the mass sexual violence in Cologne, the Berlin Christmas market attack, or the fact that migrants in Germany are disproportionately more likely to commit violent crimes [0][1][2]? What really gets me is headlines like “German far-right capitalizes on migrant crimes,” as if those politicians were happy the crimes had been committed or consented to the policy decisions that led to them occurring. [0]…

None of your links support your claim that migrants are more likely to commit violent crimes, in fact they present evidence that dispels that (very obvious) lie.

They also point out that the far-right groups that are spreading this propaganda as a means to promote their racist agenda are lying:

>But it turned out, several cases did not take place in Europe, and, with the exception of one case, there is no evidence supporting the claim that the perpetrators were migrants or Muslims.

Very disingenuous, but nothing out of the ordinary for bigoted organisations that exist only to diminish humanity.

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#267

Post by mjamil » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:42 AM UTC

_iyig wrote: post #253

rmilejczz wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All I’m saying is that it’s appalling to see all of these “solutions” almost completely ignore the root problem and instead become obsessed with “border security”. Our borders are secure, immigration is not a threat to your life, the problem is almost purely economic and I think that is the more fruitful discussion I meant no particular offense to you, I see this sentiment regularly in online forums and repeated thro…

>Our borders are secure, immigration is not a threat to your life Police keep finding bodies [0] of MS-13 victims [1] buried in parks [2] in my area, so pardon me if I disagree. [0] https://beta.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/ms-13-me... [1] https://patch.com/virginia/greateralexandria/teen-pleads-gui... [2] https://beta.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/fairfax-...

Risk is relative. What’s your standard for being secure? The homicide rate in the US is 4.9/100k people, which is lower than the global average. Is your standard for security measured by this metric? If so, you should feel quite good; the rate in Fairfax county is 1.9/100k people. Or is it that you’re allowing the emotion aroused by the splashy headlines you linked to color your judgement?

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#268

Post by the_watcher » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:43 AM UTC

> Although Luckey left Oculus in 2017 amid controversy over his political contributions, he has maintained some links to Facebook Inc. (NASDAQ: FB), which bought Oculus for $2 billion in 2014. Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz, sits on Facebook’s board alongside Peter Thiel, whose Founders Fund previously invested in Anduril. Andreessen Horowitz also invested in Oculus, which makes virtual reality headsets.

This sentence is really stretching for "maintained links to Facebook".

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#269

Post by CapricornNoble » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:45 AM UTC

elbasti wrote: post #171

ganitarashid wrote: post #56

What is wrong with enforcing border security laws? Curious why you think less of him for supporting those efforts.

In principle, nothing. In practice, current policy at the southern US border is directly responsible for acts which are unconscionably cruel and inhumane. Separating children, babies and toddlers from their parents. Keeping children in bed-less, 24/7 lit rooms. Not giving sanitary pads to menstruating girls, etc. The list of atrocities is growing, depressing and unforgivable. Apprehended migrants are treated in ways…

>>>Separating children, babies and toddlers from their parents.

You mean the same thing we do with American citizens who commit crimes? [1]

>>>> Keeping children in bed-less, 24/7 lit rooms. Not giving sanitary pads to menstruating girls, etc. The list of atrocities is growing, depressing and unforgivable. Apprehended migrants are treated in ways that most humans would consider too cruel for dogs.

Additional funding would help, but the same politicians criticizing the conditions also ....voted against additional funding! [2] It's almost like they aren't interested in actually solving problems....

As an aside, the US isn't alone in first-world countries with harsh immigration prisons.[3][4] Pretty much every gaijin I know understands the importance of "staying on the level" with regards to the immigration authorities here because the prisons are terrifying.

>>> Because of these policies, any increase in enforcement has a direct, causal, traceable and immediate consequence of increasing human suffering.

Or you could put personal responsibility on the people who chose to leave their homes at great personal risk, exposing themselves to life-threatening dangers.[5] Have you seen interviews with some of the detained African aliens?[6] There are NGOs feeding these people propaganda about how the US will take care of them, provide for them, and give them money. If anything, those organizations and people are directly responsible for deceiving unfortunate populations and skewing their risk analysis in order to convince them to undertake an objectively-dangerous course of action. Are you going to directly hold them accountable for human suffering, as well?

[1]https://youtu.be/ZEFoi_leYDw

[2]https://thehill.com/homenews/house/450363-the-4-house-democr...

[3]http://www.debito.org/?p=13056

[4]https://www.economist.com/banyan/2012/01/18/gulag-for-gaijin

[5]https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/28/world/americas/rio-grande...

[6]https://youtu.be/mJlOmMj21uM

Re: Anduril, a startup from Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, now valued at $1B

#270

Post by evanb » Fri, Sep 13, 2019, 2:46 AM UTC

prepend wrote: post #136

Rebelgecko wrote: post #61

For various reasons, I'm slightly sketched out by pretty much every company I've heard of that is named after something from Lord of the Rings. Even when I don't think they're contributing to a dystopian surveillance state (à la Palantir and this one), you have the other HN front-page story about Mithril Capital being accused of mismanaging investor funds. Is there some weird self-selection that causes only certain t…

I like that I’ve never heard about the Tolkien estate threatening lawsuits. It’s hard to imagine that there aren’t licensing fees in place but I’d love to read an article about the amount of money it takes to name your company Anduril (or Palantir).

There was a company named Athelas mentioned here on YN too. I can't imagine it's a good idea. The Tolkien estate is notoriously rigid.