Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

“I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

twitter.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

111–120 of 145 posts

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#111

Post by mgh2 »

pjmorris wrote: post #104
mgh2 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please expand your case. Those technologies were developed for other initial purposes, your case just proves an example of ethics depending on users

'Technology is neutral' presumes equal access to technology. Technology without uniform access yields a power imbalance.

Shifting the moral responsibility from the human/user/corporation to the technology itself seems illogical.

Democratization might work, but isn't there a risk for the user to corrupt its intended purpose due to the inherent darkness of human nature?

Ex: Initial intents of democratizing knowledge (Google) or social networks (Facebook) both ultimately ended up corroding society with misinformation, fueled by human greed in the ad industry.

What do you say of missiles, and as extension, nuclear weapons? Do you want dictatorships to have them as well? They will ultimately, but we cannot control their use for deterrence or destruction (MAD policy).

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#112

Post by Balgair »

jamestimmins wrote: post #20

Simply as an observation, it’s interesting that serving in the military is usually treated as honorable, but working at a defense contractor is viewed as unethical. I wonder why that is?

One is where you get paid, the other is where you volunteer to not get paid (well, not nearly as much). Hence, the use of the word 'service'.

It does differ by region and time, though.

Still, great observation.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#113

Post by cmrdporcupine »

iso947 wrote: post #105
iaw wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Carpet bombing can be seen as a rational response to the V2 rocket which was indiscriminate of it's targeting of Londoners. War is often a case of responding in kind. If the Germans had had the capability of bombing London they would have (but couldn't thanks to radar). This was not a small conflict but an existential fight for existence between two groups of countries. I have a hard time judging the decision to carp…

Germany did bomb the crap out of London and other cities - the blitz in London, destroyed Coventry, and the “Baedeker blitz” Which had limited military justification

Sorry but these efforts are completely pale in comparison to what was done to the cities of the German industrial heartland in the last year of the war. I have seen pictures of Mainz (my grandparent's home) where there's not a single building left fully standing in the entire downtown core.

That's not to say the Germans wouldn't have tried, if they could have. But they were tied up in the east doing very awful things there. The Russians unfortunately bore the brunt of total Nazi savagery.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#114

Post by anotherevan »

jamestimmins wrote: post #20

Simply as an observation, it’s interesting that serving in the military is usually treated as honorable, but working at a defense contractor is viewed as unethical. I wonder why that is?

I wonder if some of it is a response to how horribly returning Vietnam veterans were treated in the past.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#115

Post by zingplex »

ardit33 wrote: post #37
andretti1977 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my opinion your defense of US is completely unacceptable and wrong but i don't want to start a discussion about that: i want you to consider that in general, it's better to spend energy, focus, money and any other constructive effort in creating something that helps people instead of something that kills people, even if you consider those people bad ones. It's better to spend efforts in education and culture inste…

As i have cousins that are survivor of genocide and ethnic cleansing, which the US prevented in the late 90s by the use of such weapons, i completely disagree with you. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosovo_War But to each their own.

American weapons are currently being supplied to a genocidal war effort in Yemen and supplying weapons to Turkey which is continuing their genocidal efforts against the Kurdish people.

I'm trying to focus on active genocide campaigns that the US is supporting with weapons, not the two genocides that were instigated in part by Facebook. Let me know if I'm missing any.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#116

Post by anotherevan »

martythemaniak wrote: post #73

He shouldn't be bringing politics to work. And we shouldn't be bringing politics to HN.

What about ethics? Can we bring ethics to work? And shouldn't we be bringing ethics to HN?

If so, we have to acknowledge that politics and ethics is a Venn diagram with a lot of crossover.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#117

Post by jgwil2 »

anotherevan wrote: post #114
jamestimmins wrote: post #20

Simply as an observation, it’s interesting that serving in the military is usually treated as honorable, but working at a defense contractor is viewed as unethical. I wonder why that is?

I wonder if some of it is a response to how horribly returning Vietnam veterans were treated in the past.

That "horrible treatment" is an invention on the part of those who would like to stifle dissent and paint anti-war activism as unpatriotic.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#118

Post by pjmorris »

mgh2 wrote: post #111
pjmorris wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

'Technology is neutral' presumes equal access to technology. Technology without uniform access yields a power imbalance.

Shifting the moral responsibility from the human/user/corporation to the technology itself seems illogical. Democratization might work, but isn't there a risk for the user to corrupt its intended purpose due to the inherent darkness of human nature? Ex: Initial intents of democratizing knowledge (Google) or social networks (Facebook) both ultimately ended up corroding society with misinformation, fueled by human gree…

> Shifting the moral responsibility from the human/user/corporation to the technology itself seems illogical.

Sure, it is people who make decisions, and so they have moral responsibility (at least in my model of the world and in yours.) Consider our examples; whether it's ships and guns leading to the colonization of the US, nuclear weapons leading to the threat of nuclear destruction, or TCPIP, HTTP, HTML, etc leading to the societal effects of Google and Facebook, there are unintended consequences that wouldn't be present if the technology were absent.

> Democratization might work, but isn't there a risk for the user to corrupt its intended purpose due to the inherent darkness of human nature?

> What do you say of missiles, and as extension, nuclear weapons? Do you want dictatorships to have them as well?

So, again from our examples, in your view, 'we' (the ones with the technology) are the 'good guys', and 'they' (the ones without the technology) are the 'bad guys.' Is there something besides the technology that actually makes us morally superior, or are all humans created equal? I don't see how you can have it both ways. To me, it looks like technology is the difference, making its case for neutrality suspect IMO.

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#119

Post by thetechimist »

cmrdporcupine wrote: post #74
cycomanic wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the serving in the military seen as honourable is largely due to propaganda. There are different levels to it, but it is very obvious when coming from Europe to the US, where you see "support our troops" signs very regularly.

100% this. As a Canadian it's absolutely flabbergasting everytime I go there, the sheer level of martial obsession in the US. It bleeds over into Canada to some degree, but not dramatically. I suspect in part it comes from the country having its genesis in a war, its first president being a general, and its republic built around a president whose title is "commander in chief." That and its economic supremacy / domina…

Another Canadian who knows next to nothing of how or why its country exists. Also the spoils of war.

Only difference is... in the end it wasn’t worth continuing to fight for. What resources?

Canadians like to act like morally superior peaceful “nice guys” but we will see what happens when Toronto gets invaded.

Meanwhile, much like Switzerland, they enjoy a certain degree of immunity from world affairs and, much like England, like to talk a lot. But at least the UK has earned its stripes and protects it’s island and sticks its nose into things here and there. After all, they do have two aircraft carrier groups and those aren’t for self-defense but forward assault.

Canada meanwhile makes syrup. It’s delicious and it’s a nice place to live. But it would be so much nicer if it weren’t full of self-righteous Canadians. Imagine a Canada that wasn’t a neighbor to the USA but instead was still a territory of European countries and a neighbor to Mexico. Things would be very different indeed.

P.S. Don’t give me standard rhetoric about Canada being an ally and helping a bit in the Gulf Wars. Every contribution is important. Too bad that Canadians don’t thank the Patriots who fought in the French & Indian War and who later rebuked the greatest military force in the world back to London - twice. Else there would be no Canada as it presently exists. And no luxury to spin yarns about spending less on the military. Easy for you to say when you have the USA as your neighbor. Or as Han said to Leia, “Perhaps you’d like it back in your cell, your highness?”

Re: “I just woke up one morning and it struck me that I was a murderer. so I quit.”

#120

Post by asdff »

jamestimmins wrote: post #20

Simply as an observation, it’s interesting that serving in the military is usually treated as honorable, but working at a defense contractor is viewed as unethical. I wonder why that is?

Soldiers of fortune were historically frowned upon to peer pressure people to fight for 'honor' rather than pay. The same is true today. You can read ancient greek texts griping about dishonorable mercenaries.
Post reply on HN