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Where things stand with the Department of War

anthropic.com

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Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#531

Post by embedding-shape »

jmward01 wrote: post #25
hglaser wrote: post #18

It is incredible how far the overton window has moved on this issue. When I graduated in 2007, it was common for tech companies to refuse to let their systems be used for war, and it was an ordinary thing when some of my graduating classmates refused to work at companies that did let their systems be used for war. Those refusals were on moral grounds. Now Anthropic wants to have two narrow exceptions, on pragmatic an…

Yes, and even their two exceptions, only one is on moral grounds. They don't want to provide tools for autonomous killing machines because the technology isn't good enough, yet. Once that 'yet' is passed they will be fine supplying that capability. Anthropic is clearly the better company over OpenAI, but that doesn't mean they are good. 'lesser evil' is the correct term here for sure.

> Anthropic is clearly the better company over OpenAI

Why do people keep falling into traps of anthropomorphize companies like this? What's the point? Either you care about a company in the "for-profit" sense, and then money is all that matters (so clearly OpenAI currently wins there), or you care about pesky things like morality and ethics, and then you should look beyond corporations, because they're not humans, stop treating them as such. Both of them do their best to earn as much as possible, and that's their entire "morality", as they're both for-profit companies,.

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#532

Post by DavidVoid »

hglaser wrote: post #18

It is incredible how far the overton window has moved on this issue. When I graduated in 2007, it was common for tech companies to refuse to let their systems be used for war, and it was an ordinary thing when some of my graduating classmates refused to work at companies that did let their systems be used for war. Those refusals were on moral grounds. Now Anthropic wants to have two narrow exceptions, on pragmatic an…

There's an old German short film called Nicht löschbares Feuer (Inextinguishable Fire, 1969)[1] that I'm fond of. It was a protest film against Napalm and how some companies wouldn't really let their employees know what they were actually working on.

"I am a worker and I work in a vacuum cleaner factory. My wife could use a vacuum cleaner. That's why everyday I pick up a piece. At home I try to assemble the vacuum cleaner. But however I try, it always becomes a sub-machine gun.

...

This vacuum cleaner can become a useful weapon. This sub-machine gun can become a useful household appliance.

What we produce it depends on the workers, students, and engineers."

That last line is still very relevant today.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnpLS4ct2mM

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#533

Post by astura »

hglaser wrote: post #18

It is incredible how far the overton window has moved on this issue. When I graduated in 2007, it was common for tech companies to refuse to let their systems be used for war, and it was an ordinary thing when some of my graduating classmates refused to work at companies that did let their systems be used for war. Those refusals were on moral grounds. Now Anthropic wants to have two narrow exceptions, on pragmatic an…

This is really, really , really bad revisionist history boarding on fanfiction - The U.S. military directly built the entire foundation of the modern tech industry. There's a reason that the Internet started out as ARPANET (ARPA [now DARPA] being a DoD agency).

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#534

Post by Hikikomori »

kortilla wrote: post #448
mindslight wrote: post #317

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, a point of view without an ethical backbone, at least in the context of American society. I suppose they could be a Chinese or Russian national considering it ethical to harm the United States, but I don't see a point of drawing that distinction.

Being blanket against CBP is a position without an ethical backbone. It’s just a childish burying head in the sand. Every semi stable country enforces its immigration laws and checks passports of visitors. Claiming the US doing so is somehow unethical is completely misaligned with a sustainable welfare and government services system.

I don't see masked thugs harassing citizens in other countries. Maybe the problem isn't that immigration is enforced, its how they are doing it? Both Obama and Biden deported more people than Trump.

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#535

Post by sumedh »

throwaway132448 wrote: post #514
iJohnDoe wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was actually very impressed with their post. It’s a work of art for how carefully it was worded. My takeaway is that they are bending a knee to smooth things over. It’s business and it’s human behavior. They are actually furious and would love to tell Trump to crawl up his own ass, but that doesn’t help anyone in the long run. It’s in everyone’s best interest to get back to work and hope for the best tomorrow. It’s…

Just be mindful that you filled in the gaps between the lines with what you wanted to read, not necessarily what's true.

Has Dario been to the whitehouse?

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#536

Post by j-bos »

tdb7893 wrote: post #278
hamdingers wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I continue to be surprised how many people haven't heard term until now, it's been in common use in the US for 20+ years. To me the most Orwellian thing is everyone using the newspeak name for the DoD.

I went to a military high school up until 2011 and never remember hearing it. My dad and grandpa were military for 20 years each and I've never heard either say it. It definitely hasn't been used broadly in the US for very long (maybe in very specific circles). Even my friends who work as engineers for defense contractors now have never called people "war fighters" around me.

It's been on thr MRE's for decades, hasn't it? At least that's what I remember seeing after disaster relief came in.

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#537

Post by raffael_de »

hglaser wrote: post #18

It is incredible how far the overton window has moved on this issue. When I graduated in 2007, it was common for tech companies to refuse to let their systems be used for war, and it was an ordinary thing when some of my graduating classmates refused to work at companies that did let their systems be used for war. Those refusals were on moral grounds. Now Anthropic wants to have two narrow exceptions, on pragmatic an…

> moral grounds

more like fashionable virtue signaling that survives only the least amount of inconvenience

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#538

Post by ap99 »

DesaiAshu wrote: post #53
simonw wrote: post #12

Raised an eyebrow a little at this sentence: "Anthropic has much more in common with the Department of War than we have differences."

The Department of Defense was named as such after the detonations of the atomic bomb in Hiroshima and Nagasaki We - as a humanity - collectively recognized the weight of our creation, and decided to walk back Discussing “AI alignment” in the same breadth as aligning with a “Department of War” (in any country) is simply not an intellectually sound position None of the countries we’ve attacked this year pose an existen…

Technology and national defense are 100% part of the same conversation.

I'm not saying the government can't overreach or over control, but if I or you or any of us were in charge of the defense of a country then we'd want to make sure technology from our country at the very least wasn't used to hurt us and if possible used to help us.

That's what alignment means and it's totally reasonable.

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#539

Post by motbus3 »

ryandrake wrote: post #40
hglaser wrote: post #18

It is incredible how far the overton window has moved on this issue. When I graduated in 2007, it was common for tech companies to refuse to let their systems be used for war, and it was an ordinary thing when some of my graduating classmates refused to work at companies that did let their systems be used for war. Those refusals were on moral grounds. Now Anthropic wants to have two narrow exceptions, on pragmatic an…

> it was an ordinary thing when some of my graduating classmates refused to work at companies that did let their systems be used for war. Those refusals were on moral grounds. (spoiler alert) Wasn't this one of the plot points of the Val Kilmer movie Real Genius ? They had to trick the students into creating a weapon by siloing them off from each other and having them build individual but related components? How far…

If you are tricked into doing that it is not your fault. But the moment you realise you need to to a choice.

Re: Where things stand with the Department of War

#540

Post by bdangubic »

pjmlp wrote: post #469
dhosek wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet Gen X is the demographic that fell hardest for Trump.

Was it? I am not on US. If anything it is all about boomers, gen z and rednecks on YT and TikTok when going over MAGA and Project 2025 videos. As far as I am aware, the people that didn't gave a damm to elections and ignored their right to vote, are the main reason.

this isn’t true either, 2024 election saw the highest number of people voting - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_turnout_in_United_States...
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