Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

51–60 of 64 posts

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#51

Post by echelon »

bluegatty wrote: post #48
runarberg wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is why I called it tone deaf, I admit the part about American Imperialism may have been unwarranted (may is in emphasis for a reason). This engineer turned their nose at the bad architecture and glue code, but neglected to mention the total lack of morality from Palantir. I would argue that abandoning morality and aiding the American imperalist machine in its war against human rights and dignity, has been a much…

I don't think it's at all fair to make this kinds of inference from what was written, you'd have to make huge assumptions, and also take an ideological perspective as well. It might be a perfectly valid critique ... but it can't be at all inferred from the comment.

I'm really puzzled. I frequently post scathing criticisms of government spying on HN.

I'm one of the top HN commentors for the string "1984" and led to 10% of the mentions last year (as someone else blogged about).

I was just admiring the operations and scaling of it. It's pretty impressive to grow to such a scale.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#52

Post by hoytschermerhrn »

zdragnar wrote: post #40
runarberg wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Engineers turn their nose at this, but look who has tapped into this wealthy revenue stream. This may be one of the most tone deaf, american imperialist sentiment, I’ve heard on HN for a while. Engineers who have any sense of morality have a pretty good reason to turn their nose at this, and there is no but needed to follow that sentence.

If you read the comment a little more closely, it is very obvious that the "this" engineers turn their noses up at is the flexible model full of glue code, ala Salesforce, as opposed to "good architecture". It's more or less in the same vein as pointing out that WordPress powered a massive chunk of the Internet despite violating almost every good coding practice you can name, and that getting things done is what make…

To be fair, I had the same interpretation as OP here. One cannot have an earnest discussion of Palintir without at least implicitly including the privacy & military industrial complex associations of this company.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#53

Post by notepad0x90 »

rramadass wrote: post #47
notepad0x90 wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can't fight this with tech. The problem is not technological. You don't have the data to fight with either. You could live in an igloo in the arctic with no tech on hand you'll still show up in palantir's hits (unless you were born there and have nothing to trace you back to civilization). Those organizations you mention might help with corporate surveillance capitalism, but not government data mining and surveil…

You missed the point. The idea is to protect oneself by using various techniques of deception/reflexive control through stratagems like "poisoning the well", "borrow a knife", "misdirect/misinform" etc. to present different contradictory information/personas/overload-data to "The System" thus obfuscating/masking reality. You mess-up the raw data and then use reflexive control techniques to allow them to draw inferenc…

You still don't get what palantir does. they're not necessarily mining online activities of people. although they do that almost certainly. but it's things like where you life, your movements, your associations, work place, etc.. that may seem harmless but they go layers and layers deeper to presume things. For example if someone you know has a friend who is a gang member, they might associate you without your knowledge with that person. the physical stuff is hard to beat by anyone. lots of cameras, radio sensors (wifi/bt), payment transactions, ISP data,etc..

Even if they worked like you think they do, simply downloading tails, or using a VPN alone will harm you in person much more than you think. You might be driving in peace, a cop would put in your license plate and you'd be flagged from heavy vpn usage. if they can't get enough additional information on you to dismiss you as harmless, that will do you more harm than good. No facebook,reddit,etc.. then that means you're up to no good. There is not tech solution for this, it is a human problem, the problem is people.

There is an old adage in hacking circles "physical compromise is total compromise", these people have physical power and control over you. Ever heard of the $5 wrench method of defeating cryptography?

Like you, many are wasting efforts in trying to find technical solutions, instead of communicating the impact of how tech is being abused to decision makers and the public.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#54

Post by notepad0x90 »

judahmeek wrote: post #50
notepad0x90 wrote: post #15

palantir doesn't do revolutionary things in terms of back-ends. matter of fact, their apps are at best mid. I'd rate them 3/10 compared to alternatives that can do similar things. Their front end is the real differentiator. Their bread-and-butter is a few things 1) Willing to do dirty/harmful things no one else will touch 2) Making data and data analysis accessible to cops, dhs, anyone that is especially tech-averse…

> many police departments disqualify based on IQ test results measuring too high This claim is unsupported by publicly available sources AFAICT. https://www.google.com/search?q=verify+claim+many+police+dep...

are you disputing the "many" part because the lawsuits are limited in number? that aside, everything in that search results supports my statement which you quoted. they won't tell applications "you're too smart", the ones that do get sued, and those are the ones you hear about. police hiring is much more insidious than that, it's more akin to gang member recruitment. But, I will say that regional variations exist. Smaller towns or well reformed major cities might not have these issues. But for example the LA sheriffs department is not only a plain-and-simple gang, you literally have to have gang associations and participate in race-driven hostility against specific groups to be accepted.

This hiring practice is informal, similar to how last names influence hiring. the claim is also that they get rid of or reject applicants that are too smart. that doesn't mean they require applicants to be stupid, that's why as your search shows, the average IQ for cops is close to the general public's median.

Compare that with lawyers. One can argue that he people that are licensed to use violence to enforce the law should have the same level of cognitive capacity and store of legal knowledge as those who litigate the law in court. I hope you agree with that.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#55

Post by bluegatty »

echelon wrote: post #51
bluegatty wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's at all fair to make this kinds of inference from what was written, you'd have to make huge assumptions, and also take an ideological perspective as well. It might be a perfectly valid critique ... but it can't be at all inferred from the comment.

I'm really puzzled. I frequently post scathing criticisms of government spying on HN. I'm one of the top HN commentors for the string "1984" and led to 10% of the mentions last year (as someone else blogged about). I was just admiring the operations and scaling of it. It's pretty impressive to grow to such a scale.

A lot of people, especially outside the US are going to look through a cynical geopolitical lens, which is not entirely unreasonable, so it's not 'surprising' at all that people would jump on this.

For example, I think Musk is a horrible person and I view all of his statements through the 'lens' of the fact he is lying, confabulating and he's a jerk.

But - I mean, SpaceX does work, it's by all means a pretty good company (work-life balance not withstanding).

It's really hard to separate these issues.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#56

Post by runarberg »

echelon wrote: post #51
bluegatty wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think it's at all fair to make this kinds of inference from what was written, you'd have to make huge assumptions, and also take an ideological perspective as well. It might be a perfectly valid critique ... but it can't be at all inferred from the comment.

I'm really puzzled. I frequently post scathing criticisms of government spying on HN. I'm one of the top HN commentors for the string "1984" and led to 10% of the mentions last year (as someone else blogged about). I was just admiring the operations and scaling of it. It's pretty impressive to grow to such a scale.

That admiration is the tone deafness I perceived. It comes across as “we gotta hand it to ISIS” in its best interpretation.

Palantir has been on Amnesty International’s list of companies aiding in human rights violations since 2020, in particular for aiding DHS and ICE in illegal deportations and family separations, in 2023 the company provided tech to the IDF which was then used in the Gaza Genocide, the company prided it self of it (and consequently a lot of their staff resigned as their morality did not allow them to work there). This is just to say we are not just talking about government spying here, Palantir is a major participant in many of the worlds worst human rights abuses of the past decade.

Palantir is probably the company on the planet right now who is perceived by the general public as the most evil, and I for one think this company deserves this reputation. One does not, in fact, got to hand it to Palantir.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#57

Post by rramadass »

notepad0x90 wrote: post #53
rramadass wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You missed the point. The idea is to protect oneself by using various techniques of deception/reflexive control through stratagems like "poisoning the well", "borrow a knife", "misdirect/misinform" etc. to present different contradictory information/personas/overload-data to "The System" thus obfuscating/masking reality. You mess-up the raw data and then use reflexive control techniques to allow them to draw inferenc…

You still don't get what palantir does. they're not necessarily mining online activities of people. although they do that almost certainly. but it's things like where you life, your movements, your associations, work place, etc.. that may seem harmless but they go layers and layers deeper to presume things. For example if someone you know has a friend who is a gang member, they might associate you without your knowle…

[dead]

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#58

Post by tptacek »

notepad0x90 wrote: post #54
judahmeek wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> many police departments disqualify based on IQ test results measuring too high This claim is unsupported by publicly available sources AFAICT. https://www.google.com/search?q=verify+claim+many+police+dep...

are you disputing the "many" part because the lawsuits are limited in number? that aside, everything in that search results supports my statement which you quoted. they won't tell applications "you're too smart", the ones that do get sued, and those are the ones you hear about. police hiring is much more insidious than that, it's more akin to gang member recruitment. But, I will say that regional variations exist. Sm…

The claim that this has happened in the past is obviously well-supported. The claim that it's broad practice or representative in any general way of policing is more or less completely unfounded.

In fact, general cognitive tests of any sort aren't common recruiting practice. States have standardized reading comprehension and writing tests, like CA PELLET-B, but there's no high-end cutoff score for them, and there's also no direct analog between them and IQ.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#59

Post by notepad0x90 »

tptacek wrote: post #58
notepad0x90 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

are you disputing the "many" part because the lawsuits are limited in number? that aside, everything in that search results supports my statement which you quoted. they won't tell applications "you're too smart", the ones that do get sued, and those are the ones you hear about. police hiring is much more insidious than that, it's more akin to gang member recruitment. But, I will say that regional variations exist. Sm…

The claim that this has happened in the past is obviously well-supported. The claim that it's broad practice or representative in any general way of policing is more or less completely unfounded. In fact, general cognitive tests of any sort aren't common recruiting practice. States have standardized reading comprehension and writing tests, like CA PELLET-B, but there's no high-end cutoff score for them, and there's a…

I think we can all agree that police departments are allowed to reject applicants based on IQ. Cognitive tests are common from what googling I've done, although only about 10 states have IQ tests specifically. It's also hard to prove that candidates get rejected based on their IQ, it's not like this would be a department policy. Whether they exercise their right to do so, or how many exercise that right, there is no hard data that I could find, and you might be right that this is a bit exaggerated.

However, from direct experience, and the endless videos of police interacting with citizens out there, it's hard to not to draw conclusions.

I would imagine applicants would be told they're not a culture fit or something, similar to any other workplace that uses informal reasons to reject applicants. I would even agree that if you pass the right vibe-check, having high-IQ might not be an issue (e.g.: white supremacist tendency, or gang membership).

Google AI overview regarding cognitive testing (sorry, too lazy to dig up specific sources, i assume you can google the same things I did and find out):

While specific, standardized, state-wide cognitive test mandates for police hiring are not uniform across the U.S., approximately 37 states mandate or conditionally require psychological screening, which often includes cognitive assessment components. These evaluations are typically part of a broader, mandatory, and highly competitive selection process that often includes reading, writing, and, in some cases, critical thinking, or scenario-based assessments like the FrontLine Testing System.

Re: Palantir's secret weapon isn't AI – it's Ontology. An open-source deep dive

#60

Post by tptacek »

notepad0x90 wrote: post #59
tptacek wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The claim that this has happened in the past is obviously well-supported. The claim that it's broad practice or representative in any general way of policing is more or less completely unfounded. In fact, general cognitive tests of any sort aren't common recruiting practice. States have standardized reading comprehension and writing tests, like CA PELLET-B, but there's no high-end cutoff score for them, and there's a…

I think we can all agree that police departments are allowed to reject applicants based on IQ. Cognitive tests are common from what googling I've done, although only about 10 states have IQ tests specifically. It's also hard to prove that candidates get rejected based on their IQ, it's not like this would be a department policy. Whether they exercise their right to do so, or how many exercise that right, there is no…

I'm not sure how interesting you can make an axiomatic derivation of the claim that police departments widely have upper-end IQ cutoffs (or, more likely given that virtually no police departments administer actual IQ tests, high-end cutoffs on their existing domain-specific written tests).

The fact is that there are a very small number of cases where tiny departments decades ago (a) administered IQ tests for recruits, and (b) disqualified at least one candidate for exceeding a threshold. That's all the empirical evidence there is. That evidence cannot itself support the weight of the extraordinary claim that police departments generally disqualify applicants for exceptional cognitive skills.

In fact, the opposite thing is more likely to be the truth.

Post reply on HN