Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project • Hacker News Board

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#711

Post by kiliantics » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:28 AM UTC

djrogers wrote: post #558

confounded wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain the mechanics of that happening? Do you have any personal experience of unionized work? Employees having more of a say about what they work on though collective bargaining, resulting in employees having less of a say on what they work on, seems unlikely to me.

> Can you explain the mechanics of that happening? It's simple - unions can force you to join, take your money, and give it to political causes you don't support. And if you're in the minority, you don't have any say in it. See Abood v. Detroit Board of Education and several more recent cases (Friedrichs v. CTA, Janus v AFSCME). Picture this - if you were a minority opinion holder in a Google Union, and the majority…

There are many different structures that unions can have so what you described isn't necessarily how it has to work. That said, even if it is how it worked, you would still be better off on average than if you weren't in a union.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#712

Post by StanislavPetrov » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:28 AM UTC

ajross wrote: post #707

abalone wrote: post #195

I completely support the employees but it is criminal that this NYT article does not mention the extensive roots of Silicon Valley in Pentagon funding. SV as a whole is substantially a creation of military spending. Just recently in the AI space: - Siri was spun out of a Pentagon project -- look up SRI International and CALO. Its purpose: a "soldier’s servant".[1] - Autonomous driving is a direct evolution of Pentago…

> SV as a whole is substantially a creation of military spending. That's true, but not really in the general way you argue. Military spending on bay area R&D has been more or less insignificant for the entirety of the internet era. It exists, sure, but it's not driving meaningful revenue for any of the big players. Silicon Valley since the mid 90's has been a consumer thing only. And even in the genesis of the valley…

> Military spending on bay area R&D has been more or less insignificant for the entirety of the internet era.

This is ridiculously false. SV receives billions of dollars from the Pentagon, the CIA, and a variety of other government agencies annually. Here is just one example:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-03-09/peter-thi...

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#713

Post by ehsankia » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:29 AM UTC

guelo wrote: post #698

abalone wrote: post #195

I completely support the employees but it is criminal that this NYT article does not mention the extensive roots of Silicon Valley in Pentagon funding. SV as a whole is substantially a creation of military spending. Just recently in the AI space: - Siri was spun out of a Pentagon project -- look up SRI International and CALO. Its purpose: a "soldier’s servant".[1] - Autonomous driving is a direct evolution of Pentago…

Just because the United States has decided in the past that the only way we are allowed to fund tech R&D is through the military budget doesn't mean that it is the only way it could possibly be done.

No one said it's the only way, but it also doesn't mean military funding should be shunned. As long as it's handled responsibly and has well defined limits.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#714

Post by justonepost » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:31 AM UTC

abalone wrote: post #195

I completely support the employees but it is criminal that this NYT article does not mention the extensive roots of Silicon Valley in Pentagon funding. SV as a whole is substantially a creation of military spending. Just recently in the AI space: - Siri was spun out of a Pentagon project -- look up SRI International and CALO. Its purpose: a "soldier’s servant".[1] - Autonomous driving is a direct evolution of Pentago…

The internet itself is an evolution of darpa net.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#715

Post by olleromam91 » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:33 AM UTC

kachurovskiy wrote: post #203

plandis wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Id argue it's not a false dichotomy because drone strikes will go on regardless of what Google does. It's very clear that whatever collateral damage drones currently cause is an acceptable cost to the militaries using them.

"go on regardless" argument can be used to justify absolutely anything so I don't think it helps advancing the meaningful debate.

Sure it can. We can ask "what are you going to do now that we agree it happens regardless?".

If you can accept existence contains horror in all forms, then you can go on your way to make the best impact you can for those you care about.

If you can't accept that, you just sit around arguing if life could be perfect.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#716

Post by kiliantics » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:35 AM UTC

pfarnsworth wrote: post #545

confounded wrote: post #511

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you explain the mechanics of that happening? Do you have any personal experience of unionized work? Employees having more of a say about what they work on though collective bargaining, resulting in employees having less of a say on what they work on, seems unlikely to me.

I'm making almost $400,000 total compensation and I'm happily working on things that I love. I don't need a union to tax me and force me to pay dues to do absolutely nothing that will benefit me, besides pay themselves well. On top of that, having a union start representing itself as a political force will definitely upset me. I may be against the militarization of Google, but what if I weren't? What if I supported i…

You are exactly the kind of scum that would support militarisation if it handed you a cheque with the right amount. I wouldn't be sad (or organise with my union against it) if a drone vaporised you.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#717

Post by bigjimslade » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:37 AM UTC

Thank you, Google employees who signed this letter! Let us hope the, ummm, yea, "do no evil" company listens to you (and to its very own motto).

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#718

Post by kiliantics » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:38 AM UTC

ocdtrekkie wrote: post #636

cromwellian wrote: post #466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s generally not how collective bargaining works. After petition, the next step would be a strike, not mass resignations. Then if there is no resolution between management and labor, there will be terminations and regulations. Perhaps before going to premature conclusions, it might be worthwhile to wait and see how management reacts.

There really isn't a formal structure for this yet, is there? AFAIK, Googlers aren't unionized, though I definitely know a few interested that are in being so. I am also curious if you know of prior examples of strikes being on moral grounds, I usually associate a strike with demands for employee rights or compensation, not corporate behavior. This starts to move past the edge of my zone of knowledge, I've never been…

There have been many strikes on moral grounds, maybe most of them. Unions were invented as much for civil rights as they were for worker's rights. Martin Luther King basically went around the South organising and staging strikes. Civil rights couldn't have been won otherwise.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#719

Post by monfrere » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:39 AM UTC

geodel wrote: post #702

monfrere wrote: post #671

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your discussion of "legality" here is U.S.-centric. Google has offices in Germany, France, Poland, Russia, Turkey, U.A.E., India, and China, to name a few. How would you feel if Google worked on military technology for those countries? Would you point out that it was inevitable that their militaries would seek ways to use A.I.? Would you point out that the Turkish armed forces' activities are permitted under Turkish…

I am from one of the country you listed above and it seems perfectly fine to me that Google comply with existing laws of respective countries even if they are in contradiction to US laws.

FWIW, I am American, and I would absolutely object if Google were building weapons for the Chinese military. I would stop using Microsoft products if it turned out they supplied weapons for the Russian takeover of Crimea. I would delete my Twitter account if they were found to be building special-purpose propaganda tools to aid Turkey's Erdogan. Etc.

Complying with laws in another country is one thing. Working with a military, which necessarily has implications beyond that country's borders, is another. And of course even here there are different degrees. You can build a general-purpose secure email client and sell it to a country's military, or you can design their bombs. Where the line is I'm not sure, but at some point your activity is inherently violent, inherently adversarial to some fraction of people in the world.

Re: Google Workers Urge C.E.O. To Pull Out of Pentagon A.I. Project

#720

Post by hpcjoe » Thu, Apr 05, 2018, 1:40 AM UTC

mkempe wrote: post #638

hpcjoe wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

FWIW, and I use this example in discussions with non-scientists all the time, Newtonian Gravity, aka the "Law of Gravity", not only isn't a fact, it isn't even correct. General relativity appears to be a closer approximation to nature, as Sir Arthur Eddington demonstrated in 1919[1], and Albert Einstein put forth in 1915[2]. That writers continue to conflate the definition of legal "law" with scientific "law" is in s…

You're muddying the water and completely missing the point: Facts are what they are, regardless of what people may say or feel about them. The laws of physics, such as Ohm's Law, can be discovered and are facts even were people to deny their validity. The same is true for all facts of nature, including the nature of humans and their rights.

Respectfully, I disagree on both claims.

Fact in law is not the same as a fact in science.

Scientific "law" is an artifice, more of something created by someone attempting to explain using a poor mapping of language to the way scientists do their work. Scientific theory makes testable and falsifiable predictions. Gravity is a theory, not a law. It makes testable and falsifiable predictions.

Specifically, Newtonian gravity, what you call the law of gravity or a "law of physics" is known to be wrong.

Given this, how can you claim that they are what they are "regardless of what people may say or feel about them" ?

As a (non-practicing Ph.D) physicist, I have this discussion with many non-scientists, to try to help them move beyond the concept of "laws of physics" (there are none), and into the concept of testable predictions arising from the hypotheses in the theory.

Ohms "Law" is yet another example. Ohm's law breaks down spectacularly for certain materials under specific conditions. Quantum systems like Josephson junctions most definitely do not obey Ohm's "law".

In science, absolute laws do not generally exist. Using your words "regardless of what people may say or feel about them", they are irrelevant, and often incorrect. Scientific "law" is not absolute. They are not "facts".

Language, english or otherwise, is a very poor substitute for the language that testable hypotheses are written in. There is often a fundamentally severe impedance mismatch between what is written out, and what the language of science (mathematics FWIW) actually says, or even how to interpret or describe what is going on.

Without constructing a strawman, I'd like to point out that in previous centuries, people were so enamored of the fixed natural "laws", that they actually persecuted those who poked holes in them. One that comes to mind is the geocentric model of the universe.

This one is particularly interesting, as it had both religious overtones and support, and made specific predictions. The predictions of geocentricism about other planetary orbits did not match observations.

That is the fundamental Ptolemaic system law of planetary motion was wrong.

But it couldn't be.

But it was.

So astronomers developed modifications to the laws. Epicycles were invented.[1]. Which made the calculations harder. And it meant you had to discuss a mechanism by which this worked. That is the law which you are claiming to be inviolate, must be modified at best, or discarded at worse.

Add in to this very accurate measurements and analysis by Brahe, Kepler, and others, this lead Galileo, Newton and others to formulate a new model of the solar system, backed up by testable predictions. It took a while for this "law" to supplant the previous "law". But supplant it, it did.

Because science is not based upon absolute, legalistic versions of laws. Science is based upon testable hypotheses. If the tests fail, so does the hypothesis.

This mechanism survived unscathed for about 250 years or so. Until Einstein pointed out the problems with it.

My point was simply that just because the popular science writers call it a law, doesn't mean it is a "law".

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deferent_and_epicycle