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Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

wired.com

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Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#171

Post by jmward01 »

ch4s3 wrote: post #153
jmward01 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't agree with this. Just because the DOD says it is ethical doesn't mean it is so contractors have a duty to maintain ethical standards in the face of changing DOD standards. To me this means a DOD contractor decides before they go in that they will have limits and sticks to them. I think anyone working for Palantir right now should be considering the limits they have and if the company is going beyond them or n…

To a large degree you can't choose how the DoD or other letter agency uses what they buy from you. Obviously you can set some contractual guardrails but realistically if you build drones that can mount hellfire missiles you have to know that it can be misused by some 22 year old. Its tempting to believe that software is different, but once its on-prem its out of your hands.

The difference is scale and accountability. Surveillance tech is impacting everyone and is part of every kill chain but its not what people see so there is very little accountability for it. Building a drone that launches something has far less scale and far more accountability since its effects are visible. I personally think there is a big difference between being part of something with at least some accountability and limited scale compared to unlimited scale and no accountability. Of course many people would disagree and set their levels lower (mine are actually lower than this now) but I think that DOD contractors can think in at least this level of terms and decide to be apart of some things and not others in a meaningful way. No matter what though, a problem being hard isn't an excuse for throwing your hands up and saying 'I'm good because the DOD says it is ok'

Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#173

Post by nomdep »

pphysch wrote: post #124
stackedinserter wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> for reasons that nobody can quite articulate They were articulated many times, maybe you didn't want to hear. The action itself was poorly planned and executed, it's a different question.

Yeah, we didn't want Iran to have nukes, so we rugpulled the JCPOA and murdered the guy who declared a fatwa against nukes. We wanted to save the Iranian people from the regime that murdered 100,000 peaceful protestors (don't ask for evidence) so we butchered 170 school girls and didn't apologize. We wanted to stabilize the region, so we greenlit Israel's rampage in Lebanon and directly induced Iran to close the Stra…

> We wanted to save the Iranian people from the regime that murdered 100,000 peaceful protestors (don't ask for evidence)

At least 20,000 according to Amnesty International, other independent sources claim 40,000.

https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/campaigns/2026/01/what-hap...

Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#174

Post by bobsomers »

howmayiannoyyou wrote: post #103

[flagged]

> We're not perfect. We've done bad. But, you won't find another nation on earth or in history who has contributed as much to global progress, stability and well-being.

Ooook... but

> Defending the United States of America is never the wrong move.

is not the correct logical conclusion from that. The correct conclusion would be that it is our ability to reflect on the bad things we've done that have allowed us to make forward progress.

Universally defending something without considering the circumstances and context is rarely ever the correct stance.

Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#175

Post by [deleted] »

tdb7893 wrote: post #101
Ritewut wrote: post #69

Everyone in this industry should be required to read Careless People by Sara Wynn-Williams about her tenure at Facebook. Not because the book is about how evil Meta/Facebook is as a company but because you get to see the lengths people go to mentally convince themselves they are the good guy. Repeatedly in the book she tries to assure herself she's making the world better and that there's actually an ethical, positiv…

My experience is that people will be able to justify anything that is "normal". I went vegan after learning too much of how the literal sausage is made and the amount of people who have unprompted (people are weird about it so I try to avoid talking about being vegan except for mentioning it quickly while declining food) said something along the lines of "factory farming is awful but I just love bacon" and laugh is l…

[deleted]

Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#177

Post by alterom »

OneMorePerson wrote: post #128
Ritewut wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They are letting perfect be the enemy of good. If they respond with "I love bacon" then tell them to eat plant-based + bacon. It's still a vast improvement environmentally than what they were doing previously.

Yeah there's some kind of absolutism aspect tied into identity. Also the funny tendency humans have to dislike the people who are most similar to them. Someone who is at least recognizing factory farming is bad and willing to even think that far is more similar to a vegetarian than the people who don't give a shit and never even think about where their food is coming from. Obviously there's the cognitive dissonance a…

>Obviously there's the cognitive dissonance aspect to point out, but we are all doing that to some extent.

Not necessarily. I mean, the people who give out an uncomfortable laugh do exhibit signs of cognitive dissonance.

I don't have an issue with accepting both statements: factory farming is awful, and I still eat meat.

There is no cognitive dissonance.

The logic is straightforward: I do not believe that me, an individual, abstaining from meat is going to do much to factory farming, while it will make a huge, adverse impact on my life.

Government regulation is how this problem would be solved (the only way it can get solved), and I'm all for voting for bans on factory farming, heavy taxes on meat products, etc.

One's gotta pick their battles.

I pick ones where my participation won't amount to martyrdom.

Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#178

Post by bko »

Ritewut wrote: post #110
tdb7893 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My experience is that people will be able to justify anything that is "normal". I went vegan after learning too much of how the literal sausage is made and the amount of people who have unprompted (people are weird about it so I try to avoid talking about being vegan except for mentioning it quickly while declining food) said something along the lines of "factory farming is awful but I just love bacon" and laugh is l…

They are letting perfect be the enemy of good. If they respond with "I love bacon" then tell them to eat plant-based + bacon. It's still a vast improvement environmentally than what they were doing previously.

I personally think vegans should consider eating cows. If you care about sentient life and abuse, think about how much meat one cow produces. Killing a single cow can feed you for well over a year.

Re: Palantir employees are starting to wonder if they're the bad guys

#180

Post by cucumber3732842 »

corky_buchek wrote: post #129
favflam wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an irrational hatred of someone who believes in "reality distortion fields". Over the last 10 years, I also have come away with an intense impression that Silicon Valley is full of the self-delusional type, as evidenced by Sara's book, Palantir's weird advertising and CEO, and the insane Nimbyism. I believe it is in the best interest of the United States if the center of power shifts back from West Coast "tech…

> I believe it is in the best interest of the United States if the center of power shifts back from West Coast "tech bros" to the East coast. Yes, because Wall Street is a paragon of ethical corporate behavior.

The fact that they're at least honest about what they care about (money) makes them far simpler to deal with than these entities (both private and public) that spin complex webs of half truths about how they're making the world better by implementing 1984.
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