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Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

washingtonpost.com

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Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#101

Post by moralestapia »

1024core wrote: post #88
r00fus wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So "if I don't steal it someone else will"? I'd rate that as evil.

Maybe it's more like "If I don't do this job, someone else will"...

This is the big issue that came along when stable households (mom/dad taking care of you) were replaced by fentanyl and TikTok.

Moral character is something that has to be taught, it doesn't just come out on its own.

If your parents don't do it properly, you'll be just another cog in the soulless machine to which human life is of no value.

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#102

Post by [deleted] »

zelon88 wrote: post #39
Retric wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> while megacorps aren't fundamentally "evil" (for some definitions of evil), I think megacorps being evil is universal. It tends to be corrupt cop evil vs serial killer evil, but being willing to do anything for money has historically been categorized as evil behavior. That doesn’t mean society would be better or worse off without them, but it would be interesting to see a world where companies pay vastly higher tax…

You're taking about pre-Clinton consumerism. That system is dead. It used to dictate that the company who could offer the best value deserved to take over most of the market. That's old thinking. Now we have servitization. Now the business who can most efficiently offer value deserves the entire market. Basically, iterate until you're the only one left standing and then never "sell" anything but licenses ever again.

[deleted]

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#103

Post by dylan604 »

stevage wrote: post #86
dylan604 wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is Googs going to do, leave money on the table? And if Googs doesn't do it, someone else will, so it might as well be them that makes money for their shareholders. Technically, couldn't activist shareholders come together and claim by not going after this market the leadership should be replaced for those that would? After all, share prices is the only metric that matters

I don't buy that argument. There are things Google does better than competitors, so them doing an evil thing means they are doing it better. Also, they could be spending those resources on something less evil.

Remember when the other AI companies wanted ClosedAI to stop "for humanity's sake" when all it meant was for them the catch up? None of these companies are "good". They all know that as soon as one company does it, they all must follow, so why not lead?

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#104

Post by murderfs »

jsheard wrote: post #18
blackeyeblitzar wrote: post #9

Other countries will use AI for weapons - shouldn’t the EU and US also do that to remain competitive?

It's not exactly unheard of for certain weapons to be declared off-limits by most countries even if the "bad guys" are using them - think chemical and biological agents, landmines, cluster munitions, blinding weapons and so on. I doubt there will ever be treaties completely banning any use of AI in warfare but there might be bans on specific applications, particularly using it to make fully autonomous weapons which s…

They're declared off-limits because the military doesn't want them. Biological and chemical weapons aren't useful to modern militaries. Landmines and cluster munitions are, so none of the countries that actually matter have banned them!

This is an excellent overview of why: https://acoup.blog/2020/03/20/collections-why-dont-we-use-ch...

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#105

Post by mihaaly »

bufferoverflow wrote: post #76

I doubt that will change anything. It's not like Google's AI has some secret sauce. It's all published. So any military corp can have cutting-edge AI in their weapons for a relatively low cost.

With the help of Google's resources and knowledge from now on. For some dollars of course. AI will not develop itself just yet, right? So those military corp need some humans for that, preferebly those experienced already, or better yet, made it. I have a hunch, it will help them quite a bit.

By the way humans: "principles page includes provisions that say the company will use human oversight". ... which human? Trump? Putin is human too, but I guess he is busy elsewhere. Definitely not someone like Mother Theresa, she is dead anyway, and I cannot think of someone from recent years playig in the same league, somehow that end of the spectrum is not represented that well recently.

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#106

Post by ericmay »

Retric wrote: post #78
ericmay wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My problem with this take is that you forget, the corporations are made up of people, so in order for the corporation to be evil you have to take into account the aggregate desires and decision making of the employees and shareholders and, frankly, call them all evil. Calling them evil is kind of a silly thing to do anyway, but you can not divorce the actions of a company from those who run and support it, and I woul…

> made up of people People making meaningful decisions at mega corporations aren’t a random sample of the population, they are self selected to care a great deal about money and or power. Honestly if you wanted to filter the general population to quietly discover who was evil I’d have a hard time finding something more effective. It doesn’t guarantee everyone is actually evil, but actually putting your kids first is…

You'd never figure out who was "evil" because it's just based on your own interpretation of what evil is. Unless of course you want to join me as a moral objectivist? I don't think Google doing military work with the US government is evil. On the other and I think the influence and destruction caused by advertising algorithms is. Who gets to decide what is evil?

I take issue with "don't blame the employees". You need people to run these organizations. If you consider the organization to be evil you don't get to then say well the people who are making the thing run aren't evil, they're just following orders or they don't know better. BS. And they'd be replaced if they left? Is that really the best argument we have against "being evil"?

Sorry I'd be less evil but if I gave up my position as an evil henchman someone else would do it! And all that says anyway is that those replacing those who leave are just evil too.

If you work at one of these companies or buy their products and you literally think they are evil you are either lying to yourself, or actively being complicit in their evil actions. There's just no way around that.

Take personal responsibility. Make tough decisions. Stop abstracting your problems away.

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#107

Post by CobrastanJorji »

karaterobot wrote: post #10

Is this more or less ethical than OpenAI getting a DoD contract to deploy models on the battlefield less than a year after saying that would never happen, with the excuse being well we only meant certain kinds of warfare or military purposes, obviously . I guess my question is, isn't there something more honest about an open heel-turn, like Google has made, compared to one where you maintain the fiction that you're s…

I think it's unfair to bring up OpenAI's commitment to its own principles as any sort of bar of success for anyone else. That's a bit like saying "Yes, this does look like they're yielding to foreign tyrants, but is this more or less ethical than Vidkun Quisling's tenure as head of Norway?"

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#108

Post by mihaaly »

stevage wrote: post #95
ddtaylor wrote: post #66

Google has already made multiple commitments like this and broken them. One example would be their involvement in operating a censored version of Google.cn for the Chinese government from 2006 to 2010.

Someone should make a website tracking tech companies' moral promises that then get broken.

I used Google to find this: https://issueone.org/projects/big-techs-broken-promises/

Looks very incomplete....

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#109

Post by zoogeny »

It's a far cry from the days where employees were threatening to mass quit Google when it changed its policies to avoid bans in China.

A lot of what is going on in the world right now makes me think we are in a war that hasn't yet been officially acknowledged.

Re: Google drops pledge not to use AI for weapons or surveillance

#110

Post by yodsanklai »

mananaysiempre wrote: post #42
Retric wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> while megacorps aren't fundamentally "evil" (for some definitions of evil), I think megacorps being evil is universal. It tends to be corrupt cop evil vs serial killer evil, but being willing to do anything for money has historically been categorized as evil behavior. That doesn’t mean society would be better or worse off without them, but it would be interesting to see a world where companies pay vastly higher tax…

Most suggestions of this nature fail to explain how they will deal with the problem of people just seeing there’s no point in trying for more. On a personal level, I’ve heard people from Norway describe this problem for personal income tax—at some point (notably below a typical US senior software engineer’s earnings) the amount of work you need to put in for the marginal post-tax krone is so high it’s just demotivati…

> the amount of work you need to put in for the marginal post-tax krone is so high it’s just demotivating

This is a cliche you hear from right winger in any country that has a progressive tax system.

Regarding Norway, taxes aren't in the same ballpark as in some US blue states.

Also, it's a very simplistic view to think that people are only motivated by money. Counter examples abound.

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