> CS wasn't supposed to be a programming boot camp anyway, it is at its heart an academic degree much close to pure mathematics than programming. Maybe it should go back to that? Maybe college never should have been for everyone?
That's absolutely what I think, since even before the proliferation of LLMs.
> I can think of no example in history of the entire world deciding to just forsake the development of a technology because it seemed like it could prove to be too dangerous. The same psychological logic always applies.
> The problem with a very broad definition of violence is that it permits a pretty barbaric worldview. If I cut someone off in traffic, or if a careless administrative action on my part costs someone money that then puts them in a financial pickle that month, is that violence? Do I then deserve to be tracked and assaulted? What about the doctor who is complicit in the refused treatment because the insurance company won't pay a bill?
That's resolved with proportionality.
Cut me off in traffic? No biggy
Cut me off from my healthcare when I have a terminal illness? Biggy
My point is that proportionality and fault seem to be entirely subjective.
In an insurance denial, the insurance company does not treat you. The people who refuse to treat you are actually the doctors and nurses and hospital. They have the ability to treat you, but refuse to do so without economic compensation from the insurance company. Within the insurance company, there exists underwriters and individuals who work directly on the denial. Above that are layers of management, above that is a CEO, above that is a board of directors. Above that is an industry and regulatory environment and government.
If you can justify violence against an insurance company CEO, do you also justify violence against the board of directors, employees of the insurance company, the hospital, doctors and nurses who refuse to treat?
Similarly, Sam Altman is just one small component of the AI industry. He is nothing without the team of people he is leading and who have endorsed him (don't forget, Sam himself was fired and reinstated with part of the stated basis being that OpenAI employees were planning an exodus if he was not brought back), not to mention the board of directors he serves under and investors he is working for.
A lot of people will look at this argument and say that just because responsibility for harm is diffused throughout a system of people does not mean that no one is responsible and that accountability is impossible. I would tend to agree. But I would also suggest that just because no one in particular is fully responsible does not mean that one person should be singled out and targeted as arbitrarily responsibility for all harms.
Well if we're going off of total user counts of platforms, Twitter is pretty niche. I'm on every social media besides it. I couldn't stand it before Musk and I can't stand it now.
These arguments make perfect logical sense. Sam Altman has ceased to be a civilian, he has waived those rights with his DoD deal, I don't know why people are acting like he is one. I think it's cowardly that both of you are so downvoted without any responses at all against you, much less good counterarguments.
Calling it “a democratically elected government's defense department” is extremely generous and not a good point even if the premise were true.
Hitler was democratically elected, who cares?
The premise doesn't make sense either because it's hardly a “defense department” either.
It's been more of a “kill civilians and destabilize other democratically elected governments in Latin America and the Middle East department” for the past half century. It's the same “defense department” that overthrew democratically-electdd Allende in Chile and installed a dictator, killed schoolgirls in Iran (I'm not including Iran in the list of democratic places though), bombed a wedding in Pakistan with a drone, and more. It's a massive “defense department” for a country that hasn't been attacked in ages.
The US is hardly a democracy either because a choice between genocide-supporters isn't a real choice, there was no real anti-Zionist candidate.
Following or breaking the law isn't a good metric anymore. It never was really, a lot of genocides were “legal”.
Sometimes it turns into a question of which law too. The US regularly breaks international law, so why should we respect its rule of of law if it doesn't respect international rule of law?
Kissinger died peacefully and free of consequence for his warcrimes. The US threatens to invade the Hague if it tries to prosecute Americans for their warcrimes. How could anyone possibly see US law as having any legitimacy anymore?
I one billion percent prefer a flawed democracy with the rule of law, however imperfect, to a world where some random HN user thinks they their personal beliefs give them the moral authority to burn a family alive. Only an utter fool would wish for that world.
How do you reconcile violence between democracies then?
What happens when two democracies go to war?
If it were WWII, I'd support the military violence of my government against the democratically-elected Hitler.
Similarly, I think violence against the genocide-supporting US government and elite is permissible today even if it was “democratically-elected” (not that I think a choice between two Zionists counts as a real choice).
I clearly said he deserves expropriation not violence. Reread my comment.
The US defense industry profits off the mass murder of civilians including literally burning families alive as we bomb their homes. That’s mass murder at scale, not a single Molotov cocktail bouncing ineffectually off someone’s house. This is precisely the double standard I’m talking about.
The oligarchs control our political process and our laws. They bend it to their will for profit. What’s legal is not moral - they own the lawmakers and have endless budgets for the courts.
The only way to put an end to this is to expropriate them. Their extreme and disproportionate wealth gives them extreme and disproportionate power. Oligarchy is not some alternate/flawed form of democracy; these two systems are antithetical.
Why the hell are you downvoted? It's an undeniable fact that the US defense industry profits off the mass murder of civilians including literally burning families alive as we bomb their homes.
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