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Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

theintercept.com

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Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#191

Post by slg »

marklgr wrote: post #172
slg wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know you are being a little facetious with the Death Star line, but I think that bares a distinction because it would be a WMD and part of its intended purpose is to kill civilians. Likewise in our world developing indiscriminate killing WMDs like bio-weapons deserves extra scrutiny. Drones are not indiscriminate killing machines any more than manned aircraft. If they are used indiscriminately, the problem should b…

Drones can be produced and deployed in higher quantities than aircraft, and with AI you won't necessarily need one man behind each drone. So yes, it is potentially worse than aircraft, for the same reason a police/army of bots could potentially be much worse than a "conventional" one.

>Drones can be produced and deployed in higher quantities than aircraft

Once again that is a political issue. If someone finds a way to suddenly reduce the cost of bullets by 50%, the response from the military shouldn’t be to buy twice the number of bullets.

>with AI you won't necessarily need one man behind each drone

The article denies that is how the AI would be used.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#192

Post by swebs »

spiderPig wrote: post #108
rifung wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is nothing that will stop this. The military will find a defense contractor to do their bidding. But Google can voluntarily elect to remove themselves from this sector. Let some other company do it. Let someone else figure it out. The blood of dead innocent civilians will be on their hands. You don't see Raytheon, Boeing, or Northrop crying about it. I work at Google but opinions are my own. This is actually…

Think of it the other way, if Lockheed martin were to start a Gmail, GDocs equivalent tomorrow, would you use their services knowing how closely they work with the military? Would global users be comfortable using it? The whole PRISM fiasco isn't far from this. What's stopping the Pentagon from buying access to users data? It's a trust thing, imo.

>Think of it the other way, if Lockheed martin were to start a Gmail, GDocs equivalent tomorrow, would you use their services knowing how closely they work with the military?

Well yeah. The term "military grade" is one that tends to sell products.

>What's stopping the Pentagon from buying access to users data?

If there's no end to end encryption, I assume some three letter agency already has access.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#193

Post by teekert »

strooper wrote: post #58

I don't see anything wrong for a company of a particular country helping their military. GE, Siemens, Mitsubishi and all tech giants of that era did that with pride during WWII. Then why can't Google, Facebook for USA? Perhaps the illusion of globalization is making us perceive Google, Facebook and other international giants as global companies. Although, geniuses from around the world have significant contributions…

IBM also did that for the Germans in WW2, perhaps it's better to stay politically neutral for companies?

"without IBM's machinery, continuing upkeep and service, as well as the supply of punch cards, whether located on-site or off-site, Hitler's camps could have never managed the numbers they did." (This is the opinion of the writer of "IBM and the Holocaust" [0])

I bet Google is not looking forward to going down into history as:

"without Google's AI, continuing upkeep and service, as well as the supply of TPU's, whether located on-site or off-site, the US's drones could have never managed the numbers they did."

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_and_the_Holocaust

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#194

Post by apatters »

raz32dust wrote: post #84
strooper wrote: post #58

I don't see anything wrong for a company of a particular country helping their military. GE, Siemens, Mitsubishi and all tech giants of that era did that with pride during WWII. Then why can't Google, Facebook for USA? Perhaps the illusion of globalization is making us perceive Google, Facebook and other international giants as global companies. Although, geniuses from around the world have significant contributions…

Extending this argument, would you be OK if they helped other countries as well? Or just your country? I am trying to see if you are arguing from a patriotic perspective or saying that there is nothing wrong with military collaboration in general? I don't see why a company should only collaborate preferentially with one country. Either they shouldn't collaborate with any military as a part of some policy, which I don…

> Would you be OK if they helped other countries as well?

That would depend on how closely that country's interests and values are aligned with my own. This is what arms export regulations are intended to address.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#195

Post by savanta »

Maybe I'm wrong but based on my experience if you are a company who is depending on end customers then you need to have a good reputation and a very strong and positive brand.

Except your clients are totally dependent on your product with absolute zero alternative choice.

Most military suppliers don't depend on private end customers so they can be successful without worrying about public opinion.

I think Google is becoming more and more like companies Exxon Mobile or former giants like Malboro. People absolutely need their products so they can do whatever they want.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#196

Post by onli »

mc32 wrote: post #127
DrJaws wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people will see the evil as the country you are working for is known as the one of the primary aggressors and war initiators of the history that continues to kill directly and indirectly hundreds of thousands of people in other countries bringing them "democracy" where no one asked them for anything. Others will just see it as a necessity and that every company should work and help the government when they are a…

Well, what’s the alternate option? If the US hadn’t been the “police” of the world. It could have been Russia or China or India, would we rather have had them? And don’t say Europe unless you consider France and the U.K. and others and their things. We don’t live on a vacuum. If you create one, someone will fill it. I am loath to think of how much worse things could be despite the idiotic wars of Obama and W., I thin…

Absolute ridiculous false dilemma. It is not that if the US hadn't chosen to invade Vietnam and to kill everything that moves someone else would have, the US just opted to do that on their own. And it was not like they were there to free the people (from whom anyway, they were not enslaved). There was no vacuum to fill, the same goes for Iraq, Afghanistan, were the US created the vacuum that was afterwards filled by the now crumbling ISIS (though there at least the people were not free before).

And that's the core of the issue, and that is why these political comments are on point (which otherwise would be way too political for HN). By cooperating with the imperial US military Google is directly supporting one of the most evil forces in the world, by supporting the drone program they are directly supporting a program mainly used to kill civilians in the middle east. There is nothing good about this.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#197

Post by apocrypher »

blackrock wrote: post #98
strooper wrote: post #58

I don't see anything wrong for a company of a particular country helping their military. GE, Siemens, Mitsubishi and all tech giants of that era did that with pride during WWII. Then why can't Google, Facebook for USA? Perhaps the illusion of globalization is making us perceive Google, Facebook and other international giants as global companies. Although, geniuses from around the world have significant contributions…

Because it is a conflict of interest. The public has put their trust into Google for 20 years. We supported them. We cheered them on. We have voluntarily given them all our personal data. Our emails. Our instant messages. Our voices. All of it feeds into their massive database for them to mine. We put our faith into them, in the hopes that they would honor their creed, that they would do no evil. But gradually, that…

facing needing to argue with a person trained intensively from a early age to ground all conjecture in fact and human cost of mistakes, ie a general, I will gladly face that situation over aby necessary argument with a politician, even a more sensible type like as lawmaker. our world problems ate created by distortion of reality that no soldier would indulge or permit, none i ever knew at any rate

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#198

Post by pimmen »

strooper wrote: post #58

I don't see anything wrong for a company of a particular country helping their military. GE, Siemens, Mitsubishi and all tech giants of that era did that with pride during WWII. Then why can't Google, Facebook for USA? Perhaps the illusion of globalization is making us perceive Google, Facebook and other international giants as global companies. Although, geniuses from around the world have significant contributions…

I don't have anything against tech companies helping the military, that's their choice. I wouldn't want to build that stuff, but others can make that choice.

However, AI weapons is something I strongly condemn. They raise many unsolved ethical questions, such as if they kill civilians who committed the war crime? How do you make sure they don't kill civilians?

If Google were revealed to be developing biological weapons or chemical weapons, I suspect you would have a different opinion.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#199

Post by thoughtsalone »

rifung wrote: post #103
blackrock wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it is a conflict of interest. The public has put their trust into Google for 20 years. We supported them. We cheered them on. We have voluntarily given them all our personal data. Our emails. Our instant messages. Our voices. All of it feeds into their massive database for them to mine. We put our faith into them, in the hopes that they would honor their creed, that they would do no evil. But gradually, that…

> There is nothing that will stop this. The military will find a defense contractor to do their bidding. But Google can voluntarily elect to remove themselves from this sector. Let some other company do it. Let someone else figure it out. The blood of dead innocent civilians will be on their hands. You don't see Raytheon, Boeing, or Northrop crying about it. I work at Google but opinions are my own. This is actually…

> What is "evil" about working with the military or developing weapons?

I guess this question is only asked by those who are confident that these weapons won't be used against them.

Re: Leaked Emails Show Google Expected Military Drone AI Work to Grow Exponentially

#200

Post by wukerplank »

rifung wrote: post #103
blackrock wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it is a conflict of interest. The public has put their trust into Google for 20 years. We supported them. We cheered them on. We have voluntarily given them all our personal data. Our emails. Our instant messages. Our voices. All of it feeds into their massive database for them to mine. We put our faith into them, in the hopes that they would honor their creed, that they would do no evil. But gradually, that…

> There is nothing that will stop this. The military will find a defense contractor to do their bidding. But Google can voluntarily elect to remove themselves from this sector. Let some other company do it. Let someone else figure it out. The blood of dead innocent civilians will be on their hands. You don't see Raytheon, Boeing, or Northrop crying about it. I work at Google but opinions are my own. This is actually…

Well, "evil" is a point of view of course. You don't even have to be a pacifist to reject working in the weapons industry. To me it's like working for a gambling site or a hedge fund. I'd rather work for a mission that makes the world a better place, not worse.
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