6 ms·

Well could you point to the downside of this? From teflon to internet and countless other things you use every day that came out of DARPA and other def. researc

by qaq 5y ago

Well could you point to the downside of this? From teflon to internet and countless other things you use every day that came out of DARPA and other def. research, what would have changed if it was funded via different model?

BenAufero 5y ago
I think the complaint is not that the government funds research for defense, it's that it could be funding energy, medical, etc research. I honestly don't know if I fully agree with his complaint, because I'm fairly sure the government does fund a lot of other research that isn't defense focused (see a lot of universities).
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  It funds many sorts of research but much less development. Research ideas do not develop themselves and so the story of modern academia is zillions of abandoned ideas.
jack_riminton 5y ago
History shows that conflict has actually been rather useful for our development
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  That's circular — it's important precisely because nothing else created the political will for that much state-run development. We should at least try to do non-military development, even if military dev will continue to have an edge.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
AQuantized 5y ago
The problem is privileging technologies that have defence capabilities. There are likely countless ideas that could have similar success to DARPA projects if they had similar access to capital and state support. However, unless it can show off some military capability its funding can't be justified using the current model, leaving a gigantic subsections of technologies that could have similar innovative impact underserved by this level of support.
- bobthechef 5y ago
  Without defense, the others cannot exist. Without defense, you cannot have a space within which you can securely do other work. So it cannot be a matter of competition but prioritization. Of course, we can criticize the massive amount of funding that goes to military contractors and the like (Eisenhower did). That's where the devil is: the military-industrial complex.
  - Ericson2314 5y ago
    "Defense" is the worst euphemism for the military. I wish it was still called the Department of War, which is honest. No one is saying abolish the military. In in fact we are saying some forms of state–military complexes might be good. It's the idea the state-driven industry must be tied to defense and not anything else that's the problem.
Ericson2314 5y ago
DARPA does lots of good things — I have in fact worked on a DARPA project and enjoyed it. It's well run. But each of those things has to be contorted to have a military purpose, even if the main benefit we get in the end is not military-related. We should be able to research those things just because they are good, without laundering their best purpose. And we should open the door to other things that seem just as promising, but are harder to so launder. The fact I can't tell you the counterfactual is kind of the point — most of us have no idea about the world-changing effects of the development not persued might be, just as the average person on the 1970s did not envision today's internet. The world of possible futures is simply too open ended.
WhisperingShiba 5y ago
One prominent one is that we use fear to control other countries instead of love. We spend so much human talent on defense, and sure we got a bunch of great technologies, but who's to say that we wouldn't have got them through some other avenue, later? Or perhaps even better technologies. I only speculate about the former, but I am quite certain a lot of the violence in the world has been caused by American Neo-colonialism and the terrorism we imposed upon the world. I am a betting man, and I bet that if we didn't fuck the Russians over so hard in WW2, that we wouldn't have had the cold war.
- merpnderp 5y ago
  How did the US fuck over Russia in WWII? And are you aware of the billions of foreign aid many countries get from the US which is tied to issues like human rights, freedom, and democracy?
  - WhisperingShiba 5y ago
    The US let the Russians break themselves fighting the Eastern front while they invaded north Africa. The North African front was basically secure while Stalingrad was happening, and if the US applied more pressure to Germany in this period, as the Russian requested, the Germans probably would not have done so much population damage to Russia. Bitterness of this fueled a lot of ideological tensions. I was also taught that a large motivation of dropping the Bomb was to scare the Russians. Source: My Highschool education. Obviously, commentary on WWII is not objective, but I stand by my thesis, considering the actual action that the United States engages in in present times. Its in our history to be both ideologically driven and meta gamers.
    - merpnderp 5y ago
      It’s hard to imagine the scale of the U.S. air operations against Germany and say the U.S. let the Russians break themselves without doing anything to help. Or look at the disaster that was Market Garden and think the U.S. could have invaded earlier. The U.S. was under no ethical obligation to throw away lives uselessly in a German blender as a distraction.

by qaq 5y ago

BenAufero 5y ago

I think the complaint is not that the government funds research for defense, it's that it could be funding energy, medical, etc research. I honestly don't know if I fully agree with his complaint, because I'm fairly sure the government does fund a lot of other research that isn't defense focused (see a lot of universities).

Ericson2314 5y ago
It funds many sorts of research but much less development. Research ideas do not develop themselves and so the story of modern academia is zillions of abandoned ideas.

jack_riminton 5y ago

History shows that conflict has actually been rather useful for our development

Ericson2314 5y ago
That's circular — it's important precisely because nothing else created the political will for that much state-run development. We should at least try to do non-military development, even if military dev will continue to have an edge.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]

AQuantized 5y ago

The problem is privileging technologies that have defence capabilities. There are likely countless ideas that could have similar success to DARPA projects if they had similar access to capital and state support. However, unless it can show off some military capability its funding can't be justified using the current model, leaving a gigantic subsections of technologies that could have similar innovative impact underserved by this level of support.

bobthechef 5y ago
Without defense, the others cannot exist. Without defense, you cannot have a space within which you can securely do other work. So it cannot be a matter of competition but prioritization. Of course, we can criticize the massive amount of funding that goes to military contractors and the like (Eisenhower did). That's where the devil is: the military-industrial complex.
- Ericson2314 5y ago
  "Defense" is the worst euphemism for the military. I wish it was still called the Department of War, which is honest. No one is saying abolish the military. In in fact we are saying some forms of state–military complexes might be good. It's the idea the state-driven industry must be tied to defense and not anything else that's the problem.

Ericson2314 5y ago

DARPA does lots of good things — I have in fact worked on a DARPA project and enjoyed it. It's well run. But each of those things has to be contorted to have a military purpose, even if the main benefit we get in the end is not military-related. We should be able to research those things just because they are good, without laundering their best purpose. And we should open the door to other things that seem just as promising, but are harder to so launder. The fact I can't tell you the counterfactual is kind of the point — most of us have no idea about the world-changing effects of the development not persued might be, just as the average person on the 1970s did not envision today's internet. The world of possible futures is simply too open ended.

WhisperingShiba 5y ago

One prominent one is that we use fear to control other countries instead of love. We spend so much human talent on defense, and sure we got a bunch of great technologies, but who's to say that we wouldn't have got them through some other avenue, later? Or perhaps even better technologies. I only speculate about the former, but I am quite certain a lot of the violence in the world has been caused by American Neo-colonialism and the terrorism we imposed upon the world. I am a betting man, and I bet that if we didn't fuck the Russians over so hard in WW2, that we wouldn't have had the cold war.

merpnderp 5y ago
How did the US fuck over Russia in WWII? And are you aware of the billions of foreign aid many countries get from the US which is tied to issues like human rights, freedom, and democracy?
- WhisperingShiba 5y ago
  The US let the Russians break themselves fighting the Eastern front while they invaded north Africa. The North African front was basically secure while Stalingrad was happening, and if the US applied more pressure to Germany in this period, as the Russian requested, the Germans probably would not have done so much population damage to Russia. Bitterness of this fueled a lot of ideological tensions. I was also taught that a large motivation of dropping the Bomb was to scare the Russians. Source: My Highschool education. Obviously, commentary on WWII is not objective, but I stand by my thesis, considering the actual action that the United States engages in in present times. Its in our history to be both ideologically driven and meta gamers.
  - merpnderp 5y ago
    It’s hard to imagine the scale of the U.S. air operations against Germany and say the U.S. let the Russians break themselves without doing anything to help. Or look at the disaster that was Market Garden and think the U.S. could have invaded earlier. The U.S. was under no ethical obligation to throw away lives uselessly in a German blender as a distraction.