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The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

wired.com

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Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#831

Post by pesus »

msie wrote: post #819
niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

I would be weary of nerds taking care of this nation after all I've seen in the tech industry. AirBNB, Uber, Juicero, WeWork, Theranos, Tesla, crypto...

Agreed. I used to scoff at the hate "techbros" received, but at this point the industry has done more than enough damage to deserve that derision. This is by far the biggest escalation, though.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#832

Post by saagarjha »

niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

I figure more 25 year old nerds who dismantle the US government ought to be bullied. Signed, a 25 year old nerd.

(While I'm at it, there's nothing special about age here. Plenty of 25 year olds are actually doing productive things for humanity. But many 40 year olds are doing it too. The difference is that they are competent and empathetic, not random guys who Elon happens to like.)

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#833

Post by buu700 »

jacobjjacob wrote: post #185
ian_d wrote: post #108

Elon is also now claiming to have "deleted" 18F ( https://18f.gsa.gov/ ): https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1886498750052327520

Looking at the quoted post, what do they have against Direct File? It is really hard to keep track of their positions which I believe is intentional.

Related: https://www.foxbusiness.com/politics/doge-could-create-mobil...

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#834

Post by goldenManatee »

alfalfasprout wrote: post #532
niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

First, there's hardly any evidence that these are anywhere near "brilliant engineers" let alone 1%. Their claims to "fame" were being interns or working on tightly scoped greenfield projects. Some might be interesting, sure. But it's hardly relevant to operating in a complex organization. But more importantly, the real issue is regardless of how old they are an unelected individual is doling out hyper-privileged acce…

I mean, Garry Tan has already been on Twitter with his stupid take that there are “brilliant” so it surely must be true. /s

The Treasury has been taken over and barricaded, but please enlighten us Garry with fables of their 10x brilliance.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#835

Post by tjpnz »

Would be fucking terrified knowing that my personal employment records were in reach of these children. Who's the responsible adult in the room stopping them from "losing" a backup they've made or maintaining the non-compliant equipment they'll have brought in.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#836

Post by andyjohnson0 »

niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

> The guys featured in this gross and irresponsible hit piece by Wired, by all accounts, are brilliant engineers. Top 1%.

Their youth and technical ability isn't the problem. What are problems are their inexperience and recklessness and evident lack of awareness. Government and the administrative state are serious undertakings. Move Fast and Break Things is extraordinarily dangerous in this context.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#837

Post by goldenManatee »

binary_slinger wrote: post #549
niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

> The guys featured in this gross and irresponsible hit piece by Wired, by all accounts, are brilliant engineers. Top 1%. Wheres the evidence of their brilliance? A few projects in GitHub isn’t impressive. Seriously if they’re brilliant this is the perfect PR opportunity to highlight the highly talented people making a difference. But instead we have secrecy. I suspect the real reason for these choices is they needed…

One of them transcribed an ancient Greek text from Vesuvius. So idiots buy into the idea this qualifies them to become unelected arbiters of THEIR OWN opinion of justice and decide who the Treasury pays or does not.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#838

Post by goldenManatee »

kelnos wrote: post #800
niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

They may be smart, and may have won awards, but Musk's techno-thugs are not "the best of us". At best, they're misguided and have fallen for Musk's charisma. At worst, they're actively supporting and abetting the subversion of our democratic government.

Let us also consider just how badly this continues to paint tech and tech workers to the general public. To distrust technology such as all the AI hate we see online.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#839

Post by Dalewyn »

UltraSane wrote: post #593
niceice wrote: post #440

Average age of engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project was 25. Our current gerontocracy is ahistorical. Perhaps one reason startups work so well is they are one of the few places that still let young people exert agency. The average age of NASA’s mission control team during the Apollo era was 27— they put humans on the moon. Young people bring a force of curiosity and creativity that can disrupt the status…

The age is irrelevant. What IS relevant is the fact that the engineers and scientists in the Manhattan Project were all qualified and legally hired and authorized to do what they did. This is NOT true for DOGE which has no legal right to the federal payment system and no legal authority to stop any payments congress has approved.

>This is NOT true for DOGE which has no legal right

DOGE and the Treasury Department are both part of the Executive Branch and derive powers from its head, aka the President.

This is essentially President Trump telling President Trump to hand President Trump the keys to the payment system so that President Trump can check WTF President Trump is spending money on.

Re: The young, inexperienced engineers aiding DOGE

#840

Post by iNic »

nomel wrote: post #135
xnx wrote: post #73

Are such drastic action appropriate given the current state of the US? The US probably hasn't been this economically dominant since after WWII. Feels like Chesterton fences are getting torn up left and right by people too young and incurious to possibly understand why those fences might be there.

> Are such drastic action appropriate given the current state of the US? With the debt ceiling ever increasing, approaching a trillion dollars in interest per year, nearing $6k/year per working individual, I would say the correct time to put any effort, whatsoever, into reducing spending, was 20 years ago. I think the fundamental problem is we lack adversarial systems within the government: it doesn't like to hurt it…

I am happy to cut government spending and increase government efficiency (obviously). I have so far not seen any evidence that DOGE is working is this direction. As I like to point out the marginal dollar spent on the IRS brings in ~$10 of revenue. If DOGE or Trump really cared about the deficit they would expand the IRS. They would take ease the burden of NEPA, but in the meantime increase the number of bureaucrats to make the process faster. They would reform the Paperwork Reduction Act. They would make it easier for government officials to handpick hires.

On the policy side they would push for port automation. They would get rid of the Jones act. They could standardize and simplify the tax code (& get rid of loopholes like stepped up basis)

Instead they are breaking random government websites, blocking & politicizing USAID (< 1% of budget), mass firing with seemingly no plan for running various orgs, trying to increase mass incarceration (?) and reinforcing captured markets (like TurboTax).

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