Posted on 04/08/2018 7:16:26 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
Thousands of Google employees have signed a letter protesting the company’s involvement in a Pentagon program that uses artificial intelligence to interpret video imagery and could be used to improve the targeting of drone strikes.
The letter circulating inside Google has garnered more than 3,100 signatures, reflecting a culture clash between Silicon Valley and the federal government.
“We believe that Google should not be in the business of war,” says the letter, addressed to Sundar Pichai, Google's chief executive. It asks that Google pull out of Project Maven, a Pentagon pilot program, and announce a policy that it will not “ever build warfare technology.”
That kind of idealistic stance comes naturally to a company whose motto is “Don’t be evil,” a phrase invoked in the protest letter. But it is distinctly foreign to Washington’s massive defense industry and certainly to the Pentagon, where the defense secretary, Jim Mattis, has often said a central goal is to increase the “lethality” of the United States military.
The company subsequently described its work on Project Maven as “non-offensive” in nature, though the Pentagon’s video analysis is routinely used in counterinsurgency and counterterrorism operations, and Defense Department publications make clear that the project supports those operations. Both Google and the Pentagon said the company’s products would not create an autonomous weapons system that could fire without a human operator, a much-debated possibility using artificial intelligence.
“The argument that other firms, like Microsoft and Amazon, are also participating doesn’t make this any less risky for Google,” the letter says. “Google’s unique history, its motto Don’t Be Evil, and its direct reach into the lives of billions of users set it apart.”
Like other upstarts turned powerful Silicon Valley behemoths, Google is being forced to confront the idealism that guided the company in its early years.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Google is waging war on the free society. They support communism, which is the most deadly form of government ever. Yet, they complain about working for the DoD??
Just have them paint a number on the roof of every car. That way we would sort them out.
Because Google, Facebook etc. are way way ahead of the USG and everyone else in Machine Learning & Artificial Intelligence applications. USG (that includes the military!) can’t hire these people. They just won’t come! To them government pay is unattractive and USG IT policies are incredibly inefficient & archaic. USG- the OPM 1940s & 1950s style HR & personnel systems are ineffective at hiring, paying and keeping these people.
How do I know this, I go to a lot and I mean a lot of academic & government sponsored AI & ML conferences. So I hear it all the time.
Also most technical frontline government work is contracted out, the governments presence is a managerial one (through a COTR) which usually means they just cut the check. Quite often the COTR is not even on site. (This is why building the wall will be contracted out!)
Is there a better way to do it? Yeah probably but I don’t know what it is or see it happening. Too many rice bowls would get broken!
My concern is how leaky the government is and how vulnerable our information has proven to be. I do not like people (US citizens and others) who feel no loyalty having access to private information. Crazy conspiracy thought.....could the gov be taken down just by the amount of information those who have no loyalty have access to?
I agree!
Millennials have no sense of or even feel the need for privacy. I am shocked at some of the incredible narcissistic attitudes of some of my daughter’s friends. For example they feel the need to tell everyone everywhere about all aspects of their lives almost down to their bodily functions. I ask my daughter if I say to them, ‘I don’t really care to hear this’. What’s the response? She says you get labeled as uncaring, a meanie! Apparently to millennials that’s the worst thing to be.
Then there is the problem that so many of the tech positions are filled by foreigners or by newly minted citizens (but no real loyalty!) only here for the economic opportunity. Again this is particularly true with the millennials! Also the government lets them discriminate in hiring. I have seen them do it in academia, government & industry! If you complain you’re guess what - A racist!
People from the 3rd world see a job as an opportunity to be shared & exploited with their family, clan, tribe & nationality. When you look at the culture they came from it makes sense there. You could argue that it is right & moral there but not here! Its illegal here but no one will call them on it & enforce the law.
GooGle ;; Run by libs who hate this nation, and staffed by thousands who agree wholeheartedly with senior management and would sell their souls for stock options and a bigger bonus.
This is the same AI that thought a family of black people were gorillas.
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