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'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

972mag.com

281–290 of 1001 posts

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#281

Upsetting how quickly the other thread was flagged and downranked.

As someone who sees both sides of this, and as someone who didn't understand this for some time, it's important to understand that one reason a story is likely to get flagged is because users think it's highly unlikely to lead to productive discussion . It doesn't mean it's a bad story, or even unworthy of discussion, but many types of stories seem to, pretty predictably, lead to a cesspool of comments where it's cle…

>it's highly unlikely to lead to productive discussion.

I guess all you have to do, if you want to suppress information about something, is to ensure that its comments always devolve into unproductive discussions. Funny, I once read about this as a tactic for controlling information flow in online communities...

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#282
"Lavender learns to identify characteristics of known Hamas and PIJ operatives, whose information was fed to the machine as training data, and then to locate these same characteristics — also called “features” — among the general population, the sources explained. An individual found to have several different incriminating features will reach a high rating, and thus automatically becomes a potential target for assassination."

Hamas combatants like fried chicken, beer, and women. I also like these things. I can't possibly see anything wrong with this system...

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#284
post #31

Two sources said that during the early weeks of the war they were permitted to kill 15 or 20 civilians during airstrikes on low-ranking militants. Attacks on such targets were typically carried out using unguided munitions known as “dumb bombs”, the sources said, destroying entire homes and killing all their occupants. The world should not forget this.

So the entire family and neighbors family. Sure would be convenient if Hamas is 6% of the population

convenient how, you mean?

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#285

AI generated kill lists are sadly inevitable. Had hoped we'd get a few more years before we'd actually see it being deployed. Lots to think about here

They're great because the accountability for fuckups goes on the system, not on the people using the system. "Oops, the system had a bug" doesn't kill careers like "Oops, I made a bad call."

AIs that generate kill lists that kill the innocent should themselves be put on a kill list.

Edit: And the humans who approved the list should be help accountable, of course.

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#286

Upsetting how quickly the other thread was flagged and downranked.

As someone who sees both sides of this, and as someone who didn't understand this for some time, it's important to understand that one reason a story is likely to get flagged is because users think it's highly unlikely to lead to productive discussion . It doesn't mean it's a bad story, or even unworthy of discussion, but many types of stories seem to, pretty predictably, lead to a cesspool of comments where it's cle…

flagging is voting to censor a particular view. it could have legit uses like spam or toxic comments but just as easy to censor narratives that isn't aligned or clashes with the voter's

im not sure what other tools exist other than a block button like X

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#287

AI generated kill lists are sadly inevitable. Had hoped we'd get a few more years before we'd actually see it being deployed. Lots to think about here

I don't know about kill lists, but AI weapons kinda make sense. No weapons are nice, but if the good guys don't develop AI weapons, the bad guys will. From what I gather, many US engineers are morally opposed to them. But if China develops them and gets into a war with the US, will Americans be happy to lose knowing that they have the moral high ground?

This assumes that AI based weaponry provides value. The case in point here is showing that the only value it provides is a flimsy justification for civilian casualties. We... Don't need more of that in the US, nor would it provide a "good guy" any legitimate value.

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#288

Israel's evil keeps taking me by surprise. I guess when people go down the path of dehumanization there are truly no limits to what they are ready to do. But what is even sadder is that the supposedly morally superior western world is entirely bribed and blackmailed to stand behind Israel. And then you have countries like Germany where you get thrown in jail for being upset at Israel.

what do you mean "bribed and blackmailed"?

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#289

I wonder how accurate this technology really is or if they care so little for the results and instead more for the optics of being seen as advanced. On one hand, it’s scary to think this technology exists but on the other, it might just be a pile of junk since the output is so biased. What’s even scarier is that it’s proof that people in power don’t care about “correct”, they care about having a justification to conf…

It's unconfirmed who authorized it but the recent food charity workers killed by Israeli bombing had a security person (death confirmed by family in UK) who is unarmed but by job description clears the way by telling Israeli authorities where the charity team is going to be so the chain of command knew who they were, so one is naturally lead to ask - who would authorize a targeted killing in this situation? The after…

Haaretz reports that the ground troops in Gaza are acting on their own and in a state of anarchy.

https://archive.is/2024.04.02-205352/https://www.haaretz.com...

Re: 'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing in Gaza

#290

Two sources said that during the early weeks of the war they were permitted to kill 15 or 20 civilians during airstrikes on low-ranking militants. Attacks on such targets were typically carried out using unguided munitions known as “dumb bombs”, the sources said, destroying entire homes and killing all their occupants. The world should not forget this.

With 37,000 Palestinians marked as suspected militants, it would mean they expected up to 555,000 - 740,000 civilian casualties.
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