Why American tech companies need to help build AI weaponry(washingtonpost.com)
washingtonpost.com
Why American tech companies need to help build AI weaponry
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/06/25/ai-weapon-us-tech-companies/
30 comments
Some types of tech are easier to ban. But some type of reesearch is near impossible to ban and verify that no one is actually working on it.
> "We have managed to ban chemical weapons. laser blinding weapons and biological weapons on a global scale."
Bret Deveraux made a very compelling case that those bans only happened because those weapons were largely ineffective: https://acoup.blog/2020/03/20/collections-why-dont-we-use-ch...
Bret Deveraux made a very compelling case that those bans only happened because those weapons were largely ineffective: https://acoup.blog/2020/03/20/collections-why-dont-we-use-ch...
We just had a pandemic whose cause is plausibly linked to bioweapons research. No one can possibly make the statement that we've managed to ban bio weapons in good faith.
I know we're all quite literally sick of it, but the pandemic is still going.
Covid keeps killing more people every month than flu does in a year.
Covid keeps killing more people every month than flu does in a year.
People die. Not going to hide inside my house or really care all that much. I mean... I'm sorry if you lost someone, we all did. People getting sick is no reason to suspend daily life.
The main thing that I learned over these four years is that an insane percentage of people are unbelievably selfish.
The whole human in the loop thing sure seems to be getting quieter by the minute.
The idea of trusting any AI with the error rate, "hallucination" tendencies and general fuckery of GPT with life-or-death decisions in any human sphere is ghastly.
If the idea of humans in the loop has been massively displaced from customer service in the major BigTech megacorps (nearly a foregone surrender to tendency by now) let's hope it at least stays out of other much more critical areas.
If the idea of humans in the loop has been massively displaced from customer service in the major BigTech megacorps (nearly a foregone surrender to tendency by now) let's hope it at least stays out of other much more critical areas.
When does AI become smart enough to “lift all boats”?
Make code, not war
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I agree with very little of this, but good to know what Palantir thinks we should be spending our effort on.
First we invent a machine to kill, then someone invents a machine to kill that machine, and so on. We call this progress. An endless cycle of violence perpetuated by the pursuit of one group's security at the expense of another's.
Is warfare a fact of life? Maybe. But to take actions which logically and demonstrably create the very insecurity they are meant to avoid is irrational. Point this out and you are branded an idealist. "Humanity is doomed to violence, so always be ready to kill" is apparently sage wisdom.
Is warfare a fact of life? Maybe. But to take actions which logically and demonstrably create the very insecurity they are meant to avoid is irrational. Point this out and you are branded an idealist. "Humanity is doomed to violence, so always be ready to kill" is apparently sage wisdom.
Within a systemic lens, yes it is. As weaponry has gotten more deadly, conflicts have gotten less.
There has never been an instance of stable human civilization (beyond small groups or extremely defensible/remote locations) that did not involve the ability to be violent. That ability is not durable. The skills required to ensure it does not become the purpose of a society is not durable. It takes craft, community, and hard work to cultivate the readiness for violence and restrain its application.
It is fine for people to disavow violence. It is beneficial that they do. You will find in the military people who value pacifism more deeply than your average citizen.
We do not have to believe or participate in something to be grateful for the people who do. One personal experience with violence and the value of the readiness to respond becomes apparent.
There has never been an instance of stable human civilization (beyond small groups or extremely defensible/remote locations) that did not involve the ability to be violent. That ability is not durable. The skills required to ensure it does not become the purpose of a society is not durable. It takes craft, community, and hard work to cultivate the readiness for violence and restrain its application.
It is fine for people to disavow violence. It is beneficial that they do. You will find in the military people who value pacifism more deeply than your average citizen.
We do not have to believe or participate in something to be grateful for the people who do. One personal experience with violence and the value of the readiness to respond becomes apparent.
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The issue with your take is that those who believe humanity is doomed to violence have hard scientific evidence on their side.
By inductive reasoning that's an understandable opinion; human beings have had wars somewhere every day for thousands of years. Is the conclusion that therefore violence is inevitable prescriptive as well? Where do we draw the line between accepting necessary violence (someone attacks you) and perpetuating the cycle (arms races)? Do the laws of physics somehow require humans to engage in violent conflicts?
It seems evident to me that the root of these problems is in our thinking; when we engage in everyday behaviors and experience unexpected results, we easily recognize the error and take corrective action. For instance, if you take a wrong turn while driving. But when the same thing happens with violent conflicts, we seem to shrug our shoulders and say "nothing to learn here, it's just the human condition".
Maybe the best we can do is individually not contribute to the various forms of violence. This requires a level of responsibility that is abdicated when we start with the conclusion that violence is mandatory. It's not very scientific to start with a conclusion.
It seems evident to me that the root of these problems is in our thinking; when we engage in everyday behaviors and experience unexpected results, we easily recognize the error and take corrective action. For instance, if you take a wrong turn while driving. But when the same thing happens with violent conflicts, we seem to shrug our shoulders and say "nothing to learn here, it's just the human condition".
Maybe the best we can do is individually not contribute to the various forms of violence. This requires a level of responsibility that is abdicated when we start with the conclusion that violence is mandatory. It's not very scientific to start with a conclusion.
> It seems evident to me that the root of these problems is in our thinking; when we engage in everyday behaviors and experience unexpected results, we easily recognize the error and take corrective action. For instance, if you take a wrong turn while driving. But when the same thing happens with violent conflicts, we seem to shrug our shoulders and say "nothing to learn here, it's just the human condition".
I'm having trouble understanding here. Is your contention that the alternative to being a pacifist means giving up?
To the contrary, the proliferation of nuclear weapons has resulted in a world safer than it's ever been
I'm having trouble understanding here. Is your contention that the alternative to being a pacifist means giving up?
To the contrary, the proliferation of nuclear weapons has resulted in a world safer than it's ever been
We may not have a lot to discuss if your idea of safety is everyone having loaded guns pointed at each other. To me that is an extremely precarious position especially if we have accepted as wisdom that violence, maybe even preemptive violence, might be necessary. Is indefinite cold war really our highest aspiration?
I'm trying to suggest that human beings engage in all sorts of destructive behaviors, including warfare, because of the way we think about the world. We compartmentalize violence, pollution, etc, advocate for the security of our nation-state at the expense of others, and ignore the "externalities", i.e. the simple fact that everything is connected. This tendency perpetuates the very cycles of conflict that most people feel like we could do without.
And yet somehow it's easier to see that you've gone too far east and to go west instead, or vice versa. But for non-trivial matters it seems people want a fixed action pattern to which to cling ("never use force" or "be ready to shoot first") and get confused by comments such as mine which aren't advocating any fixed strategy because the fixed strategies are what got us in this mess.
I'm trying to suggest that human beings engage in all sorts of destructive behaviors, including warfare, because of the way we think about the world. We compartmentalize violence, pollution, etc, advocate for the security of our nation-state at the expense of others, and ignore the "externalities", i.e. the simple fact that everything is connected. This tendency perpetuates the very cycles of conflict that most people feel like we could do without.
And yet somehow it's easier to see that you've gone too far east and to go west instead, or vice versa. But for non-trivial matters it seems people want a fixed action pattern to which to cling ("never use force" or "be ready to shoot first") and get confused by comments such as mine which aren't advocating any fixed strategy because the fixed strategies are what got us in this mess.
> Is indefinite cold war really our highest aspiration?
It's literally brought about the longest period of peace between major world powers, in basically the entire history of civilization.
> I'm trying to suggest that human beings engage in all sorts of destructive behaviors, including warfare, because of the way we think about the world. We compartmentalize violence, pollution, etc, advocate for the security of our nation-state at the expense of others, and ignore the "externalities", i.e. the simple fact that everything is connected. This tendency perpetuates the very cycles of conflict that most people feel like we could do without.
At the end of the day human conflict is rooted in simple physics and biology. We compete for a limited set of resources. Even if everyone had every resource they wanted, they'd still compete for sexual partners. You're not going to fix biology or physics. If you have an issue with this, I'd suggest filing a complaint with God.
Literally no movement to ignore these very real constraints has ever been met with success. Some have shown promise on very small scales, but these usually end up petering out due to lack of new converts, or descend into madness upon scale. Can you point to anything that substantiates your point?
> And yet somehow it's easier to see that you've gone too far east and to go west instead, or vice versa. But for non-trivial matters it seems people want a fixed action pattern to which to cling ("never use force" or "be ready to shoot first") and get confused by comments such as mine which aren't advocating any fixed strategy because the fixed strategies are what got us in this mess.
What is your comment? No one can choose on behalf of others. You can only choose on behalf of yourself. Hence the issue.
It's literally brought about the longest period of peace between major world powers, in basically the entire history of civilization.
> I'm trying to suggest that human beings engage in all sorts of destructive behaviors, including warfare, because of the way we think about the world. We compartmentalize violence, pollution, etc, advocate for the security of our nation-state at the expense of others, and ignore the "externalities", i.e. the simple fact that everything is connected. This tendency perpetuates the very cycles of conflict that most people feel like we could do without.
At the end of the day human conflict is rooted in simple physics and biology. We compete for a limited set of resources. Even if everyone had every resource they wanted, they'd still compete for sexual partners. You're not going to fix biology or physics. If you have an issue with this, I'd suggest filing a complaint with God.
Literally no movement to ignore these very real constraints has ever been met with success. Some have shown promise on very small scales, but these usually end up petering out due to lack of new converts, or descend into madness upon scale. Can you point to anything that substantiates your point?
> And yet somehow it's easier to see that you've gone too far east and to go west instead, or vice versa. But for non-trivial matters it seems people want a fixed action pattern to which to cling ("never use force" or "be ready to shoot first") and get confused by comments such as mine which aren't advocating any fixed strategy because the fixed strategies are what got us in this mess.
What is your comment? No one can choose on behalf of others. You can only choose on behalf of yourself. Hence the issue.
> It's literally brought about the longest period of peace between major world powers, in basically the entire history of civilization.
What may look to you like peace is still a mexican standoff. On small time scales no one is firing a weapon but it's not an environment I'd call peaceful.
> At the end of the day human conflict is rooted in simple physics and biology. We compete for a limited set of resources. Even if everyone had every resource they wanted, they'd still compete for sexual partners. You're not going to fix biology or physics. If you have an issue with this, I'd suggest filing a complaint with God.
I don't think using physics to explain warfare would be simple at all. Biologically, I agree that situational constraints sometimes do potentiate conflict. But my complaint is firmly with humans, not some made-up external force they imagine to be responsible. If you would use violence to obtain sexual partners that's on you, not God.
I'm not suggesting that people ignore real constraints, that would be as irrational as ignoring the consequences of actions. I'm also not claiming to have a formula, or system to achieve this. I'm saying we discount the possibility of anything new or different at our own peril. I just can't accept that "God made us violent, so stop worrying and love the bomb" is the only conclusion a truly serious person could come to.
> What is your comment? No one can choose on behalf of others. You can only choose on behalf of yourself. Hence the issue.
I agree that there is no simple solution to ending humanity's destructive tendencies because society cannot change from the top down, only the bottom up (or inside out if you prefer).
What may look to you like peace is still a mexican standoff. On small time scales no one is firing a weapon but it's not an environment I'd call peaceful.
> At the end of the day human conflict is rooted in simple physics and biology. We compete for a limited set of resources. Even if everyone had every resource they wanted, they'd still compete for sexual partners. You're not going to fix biology or physics. If you have an issue with this, I'd suggest filing a complaint with God.
I don't think using physics to explain warfare would be simple at all. Biologically, I agree that situational constraints sometimes do potentiate conflict. But my complaint is firmly with humans, not some made-up external force they imagine to be responsible. If you would use violence to obtain sexual partners that's on you, not God.
I'm not suggesting that people ignore real constraints, that would be as irrational as ignoring the consequences of actions. I'm also not claiming to have a formula, or system to achieve this. I'm saying we discount the possibility of anything new or different at our own peril. I just can't accept that "God made us violent, so stop worrying and love the bomb" is the only conclusion a truly serious person could come to.
> What is your comment? No one can choose on behalf of others. You can only choose on behalf of yourself. Hence the issue.
I agree that there is no simple solution to ending humanity's destructive tendencies because society cannot change from the top down, only the bottom up (or inside out if you prefer).
Yes, that is sage wisdom. It is a fallacy to think that humans exist in any sort of harmony with nature. The law of nature is kill or be killed. I’m reminded of this each summer when wasps try to take my home from me.
While it's all thermodynamic deadweight loss, if I have to choose between them I'd rather the machines were destroying just machines, not the humans.
No.
> The record of humanity’s management of the [nuclear] weapon — imperfect and, indeed, dozens of times nearly catastrophic — has been remarkable. Nearly a century of some version of peace has prevailed in the world without a great-power military conflict.
This is so offensive. I am infuriated. The last hundred years has been anything but peace for Middle East. You can continue not caring from SF.
This is so offensive. I am infuriated. The last hundred years has been anything but peace for Middle East. You can continue not caring from SF.
The middle east is not the only part of the planet. The middle east's current state used to be the regular state for Europe and most of the rest of the world. The world today is objectively more peaceful than ever.
By and large, had the nuclear non-proliferationists been stopped, there would also be no war in Ukraine.
By and large, had the nuclear non-proliferationists been stopped, there would also be no war in Ukraine.
No one likes to hear it and that's why you're being downvoted, but it turns out that it takes putting the gun to our collective heads for us to realize that pulling the trigger is a bad idea. I do think nuclear non-proliferation is a double-edged sword, and states that have pursued it have not fared well.
The argument that "bad people will do X", so we must do X to them first, is a race to the bottom.
This article is, however, very revealing about what Palantir wants to happen, without ever mentioning the profit motive.