Why was the headline altered?
Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
341–350 of 405 posts
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#342Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even before Fairchild Semiconductor was founded, much of the original SF Bay Area tech industry started during and after WWII to develop radar and electronic warfare systems for the military.
Is there a place I can read about this? I am doing research on tech-histories (mainly in Asia) and i would say 100% of all tech coming from there has its origins in radio and radar tech, yes including fridges (you might have in your home right now)
https://steveblank.com/secret-history/ is all about it.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#343Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ok you say rockets and space were "worthwhile" and missiles are "a different question". But of course the space race proceeded from work on missiles. ICMBs are rockets that go high and fast and then happen to complete less than one full orbit. And my understanding is that early ICs were for missiles because it was acceptable for the ICs to be very expensive in exchange for them being very light and small. Only a cont…
I mean there's a very clear difference between 'strategic tech' that's supported by defence (GPS) - and weapons systems (Spitfire). And yes, some weapons systems are just ... 'weapons related' ... and the dual-use comes later, so it's more nuanced. Some of it more obvious (radar), than others (cruise missiles). But I think it's important to characterize these things.
Why is it important? Do those arbitrary labels allow us to feel morally superior to those who make different choices?
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#344Earlier quoted context omitted.
> "someone else will do it if i don't".... (aka your argument) That's not the argument. It's more like "if I don't do it then I better hope somebody else will, otherwise my whole country will inevitably become subservient to a despotic regime". Basically, the question is whether strict pacifism is a tenable national policy in the real world. All of modern and ancient history up to this point seems to suggest it is no…
I think the better argument is that Europe has a credible nuclear defense, therefore they don't need conventional military. If Russia starts rolling tanks towards Berlin, drop a nuke outside their international waters and announce the next one will be on Moscow
How about if Russia starts sending troops to "protect" the ethnic Russian population in Latvia? Would the USA, UK, and/or France really threaten to nuke Moscow and start WW3 in that scenario? It's better to have a credible conventional deterrent and a range of possible responses instead of betting everything on an all-or-nothing nuclear response.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#345Earlier quoted context omitted.
I mean there's a very clear difference between 'strategic tech' that's supported by defence (GPS) - and weapons systems (Spitfire). And yes, some weapons systems are just ... 'weapons related' ... and the dual-use comes later, so it's more nuanced. Some of it more obvious (radar), than others (cruise missiles). But I think it's important to characterize these things.
Why is it important? Do those arbitrary labels allow us to feel morally superior to those who make different choices?
Because building 'GPS', 'LLMs', 'food preservation', 'vaccines' and 'off-road vehicles' is not 'arbitrarily different' from building 'cruise missiles' or 'F22 fighters'.
They are completely different things.
'Tech' that can be used by the military', and 'weapons' are not 'arbitrary labels'.
HN is the only place in the world where someone would try to conflate the two to make a point, I don't think it's reasonable.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#346Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe I'm slow , but how is that relevant to the point? Can you expand? Am I understand is that defense is important because sooner or later someone else may choose aggression. You might put your life savings on the street in front of your house for a day or two without someone stealing it, but sooner or later someone unscrupulous is likely to come along based on the evidence we have
The person I replied to stated that a country refusing to develop military tech for moral reasons was destined to fall to a country that ignores morals and develops that tech. I pointed to an example of an aggressor nation that is refusing to use all the military tech at its disposal. Modern society has decided that ethics don't go completely out the window in war and by and large nation states at least pretend they…
I got that far. Does the 2nd point contradict the first (setting aside the question of if other deterrents are at play in Russia?)
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#347Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the better argument is that Europe has a credible nuclear defense, therefore they don't need conventional military. If Russia starts rolling tanks towards Berlin, drop a nuke outside their international waters and announce the next one will be on Moscow
How about if Russia starts sending troops to "protect" the ethnic Russian population in Latvia? Would the USA, UK, and/or France really threaten to nuke Moscow and start WW3 in that scenario? It's better to have a credible conventional deterrent and a range of possible responses instead of betting everything on an all-or-nothing nuclear response.
What about https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Occupied instead? I've found that to be rather entertaining, when the 1st season began. Though only the pilot and 1st few episodes. What came later was just so-so.
Enjoy.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#348Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think the better argument is that Europe has a credible nuclear defense, therefore they don't need conventional military. If Russia starts rolling tanks towards Berlin, drop a nuke outside their international waters and announce the next one will be on Moscow
How about if Russia starts sending troops to "protect" the ethnic Russian population in Latvia? Would the USA, UK, and/or France really threaten to nuke Moscow and start WW3 in that scenario? It's better to have a credible conventional deterrent and a range of possible responses instead of betting everything on an all-or-nothing nuclear response.
I dont think they would, but think it would work if they did
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#349Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cluster munitions are highly effective at destroying massed formations of men and equipment. This forces the attacker to heavily armor up, which doesn’t work well against modern cluster munitions, and/or disperse forces across a very large area so that few targets will be within the kill zone of a cluster munition to limit their effectiveness. They limit the ability of an attacker to mass vast forces in an area for a…
Today that role (strongly discouraging grouped formations) has been occupied by drones. The current UA/RU front is a 30km deep kill zone crossed by FPV craft (and discarded optic fibre cables) in which the largest effective group size might be four or so soldiers. Tanks are all but useless as sitting ducks. Reuters made a surprisingly good infographic / interactive feature on this this past July: https://www.reuters.…
Some aspects of modern warfare seem to be taking the classic idea of light infantry and dialing it up to 11. They have little armor or heavy weaponry but are such a fluid sparse target and have such a small logistical footprint that they are expensive and difficult to root out.
The modern version of this allows the same soldiers to command heavier, better weaponry via remote control that is asymmetric to their logistical footprint, enabling them to shape a battle space that would not have been possible historically.
Of course these things ebb and flow. I imagine the solution to this problem is something like autonomous drone swarms with advanced sensors that can systematically sterilize an area of any hidden soft targets. Sparsity would not be much of a defense in this case.
Re: Silicon Valley is transforming the military-industrial complex? (2024)
#350Earlier quoted context omitted.
Why is it important? Do those arbitrary labels allow us to feel morally superior to those who make different choices?
Because building 'GPS', 'LLMs', 'food preservation', 'vaccines' and 'off-road vehicles' is not 'arbitrarily different' from building 'cruise missiles' or 'F22 fighters'. They are completely different things. 'Tech' that can be used by the military', and 'weapons' are not 'arbitrary labels'. HN is the only place in the world where someone would try to conflate the two to make a point, I don't think it's reasonable.
That's just your meaningless opinion.