Google and Pentagon reportedly agree on deal for 'any lawful' use of AI

Post by Forgeties79 » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 9:35 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #257

Forgeties79 wrote: post #203

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We aren’t Russian and Putin is not our leader. We can choose how we behave and operate. This is like saying we should use chemical weapons if someone else deploys one. You’re speaking as if it’s all so binary. “Do what they do or you lose.”

It's cheap and easy for someone sitting safely behind a computer to pretend to be morally superior when you're not the one who has to make hard decisions, or deal with the consequences. Chemical weapons have seen minimal use after WWI largely because they're not very militarily effective. Autonomous kinetic weapons actually work . Right now Ukrainians are building autonomous weapons to defend themselves against Russi…

Post by nradov » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 9:56 PM UTC

convolvatron wrote: post #252

nradov wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sounds good! Please convince Vladimir Putin to choose civility over barbarity, then get back to us so we can discuss options.

I wasn't aware that the US was throwing away its moral compass for the just cause of frustrating Putin's expansionism. The new story seems to be Putin gets to do what he wants, and so do we.

Post by DennisP » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 10:33 PM UTC

hvb2 wrote: post #234

bko wrote: post #183

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A private corporation can choose not to sell to the government. A lot of them do exactly this. A lot of hoops to jump through. However, if they do sell to the government, they shouldn't have some sneaky way to exert control over decision making using their products. We're a country of laws, and for better or for worse, these laws are made by elected officials and those appointed by elected officials. Why an American…

Your court system wasn't designed for the Executive branch acting with actual bad intent. You're a country of laws, but if enforcing them takes months if not years... Then during that time, you're the wild wild west

Post by Forgeties79 » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 10:34 PM UTC

nradov wrote: post #263

convolvatron wrote: post #252

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wasn't aware that the US was throwing away its moral compass for the just cause of frustrating Putin's expansionism. The new story seems to be Putin gets to do what he wants, and so do we.

If you think there's something wrong with giving our warfighters the most effective weapons to carry out their assigned missions with minimum casualties then your moral compass is completely broken. Personally I favor a less interventionist foreign policy but that has to be addressed through the political process. Not by unaccountable individual defense contractor employees making arbitrary policy decisions.

Post by tombert » Tue, Apr 28, 2026, 11:23 PM UTC

WarmWash wrote: post #260

tombert wrote: post #205

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I've heard dozens of people say this (and I've even said it myself) but I don't think it actually holds water. People will pay for things if those things don't suck, and it's not even hard to find examples of that (even with Google products no less!). For search, Kagi has had a growing fanbase for a couple years now, but let's take things that have been easy to get for free for decades: Movies. People have been, with…

The harsh reality is that conversion from "free" to paid is on the order of 1%. This is true for everything from patreon, to wikipedia, to kagi, to nebula, to home mailers for charity. 1% of the people pay, 60% watch ads, 39% are crusaders who conveniently are morally obligated to not pay or compensate for anything (but have their costs covered by the other two groups, who complain about ads/costs but somehow are bli…