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It's an incredible waste. The best and brightest slaving lifetimes away for things that will hopefully never be used, and if they are, for death. If only we co
by adhesive_wombat 4y ago
It's an incredible waste. The best and brightest slaving lifetimes away for things that will hopefully never be used, and if they are, for death.
If only we could just agree to staff military research on all sides with the biggest wasters and toxic personalities and let the rest of the world get on with something that doesn't leave other humans splattered across some battlefield.
- baybal2 4y ago
- golem14 4y agoJa, let's put all the Hitlers in charge of the militaries. What could go wrong ?
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoWell everyone's taking that wayyyyy too seriously. Put the assholes together and let them fight it out uselessly. They probably won't be able to agree whose name goes at the top of the table, let alone figure out to rocketry. Pardon me if burning a good propertion of the brainpower of the species on killing each other seems wasteful. Obviously you can't actually do that because that's basically a prisoners' dilemma with bombs.
- coffeeblack 4y agoAnd then there is this thing called “reality”.
- BitwiseFool 4y agoI get what you're saying, it does seem wasteful, but sadly pacifists are no match for tyrants. It is admirable to want to be left alone in-peace, but as long as there are other human beings willing to use force, it cannot be. The less a society puts towards its war-fighting capabilities the more likely it is to be conquered by some adversary. It is also probably the case that our brainpower didn't invent warfare, and that this phenomenon isn't unique to us: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gombe_Chimpanzee_War https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gombe_Chimpanzee_War
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoRight, I know it's clearly not even close to possible, it's a game theory inevitability. I mean, even biological evolution is basically an arms race. We're doing well to just be where we are in terms of cooperation at all after all these millennia. But could you imagine if we could spend all those trillions on something good (enabled by the other guys doing the same). I know, impossible. But still, imagine.
- random-human 4y agoIt would break the Matrix
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoI seem to recall that being a goal of the good guys! Though, before we do it, let's take a moment to consider most people do not look good at all in leather trenchcoats.
- jonnybgood 4y agoMany groups of people have different definitions of what’s good. Because there are finite resources these groups will fight over them to support what they think is good. Now you’re back to square one. I cannot imagine because you haven’t said anything different than history and the current state of the world. Trillions are being spent on what a people think is good for them. But you don’t think it’s good what the trillions are being spent on. And so it goes.
- dumpsterlid 4y agoBiological evolution is sort of an arms race? Wolves as a species aren't trying to eat every single deer and deer as a species aren't trying to never be eaten by a wolves (of course species don't "try", it is just a convenient manner of speaking). It is more like a balance where wolves eat the unhealthy/old deer and moderate deer population is the ideal for both species. Calling evolution an arms race massively misses the essential nature in most predator-prey relationships.
- trinovantes 4y agoLots of useful stuff came out of military research too e.g. internet, GPS, synthetic rubber, etc.
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoSure, but it took a few trillion dollars literally going up in smoke for that to happen. I'm not disputing that things come out of war, it's just not an especially great ROI.
- tick_tock_tick 4y agoI mean with just the few things they listed the ROI has been insanely good.
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoIf you spent even a fraction of the defense budget of the world on education and civilian research, you can still have those things and more. Without having to snuff out a few million people and rebuild every city in Europe and half of Asia at the same time. You could still pay those scientists, you know! ARPANET was military in origin, but "the Internet" happened at CERN, a civilian project. The ROI on CERN then, is astronomical, as it only cost a few billion. Less than a month of a war in a desert that achieved...what? And if ARPANET hadn't happened (because the US wasn't worried about having a chunk of comms destroyed in a nuclear war), the NPL in the UK was also working on packet switching networking in the 60s, and that was a civilian-industrial thing. So something roughly Internet-shaped would probably have happened anyway. While on the subject of the NPL, they also developed the first atomic clock. So then GPS also has a non-military underpinning.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- KineticLensman 4y ago> but "the Internet" happened at CERN, a civilian project The web happened at CERN, not the internet.
- moffkalast 4y agoPerhaps so, but perhaps not. The weapons that "will hopefully never be used" are the best kind - a war deterrent - and contribute the most towards peace, since the alternative is so unthinkable that nobody would ever go for it. Laws (or in this case international agreements) are only a thing if they're enforced by consequences, otherwise people ignore them the first chance they get... as it's become painfully obvious these past few months. It's pretty clear that without those brilliant minds that invented nukes we'd be at WW4 or 5 by now.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- WastingMyTime89 4y ago> as it's become painfully obvious these past few months Then again it might have been less obvious if the USA didn’t push its military alliance towards the east contrary to the opinions of its own diplomats for the past thirty years at the expense of its stated goal of furthering peace and been consistently working on disturbing the balance with projects like the BMD. So actually it’s not pretty clear at all.
- nocoiner 4y agoGod, I love it when I come across a Russian troll in the wild. Nice work on getting your definite articles right on this one!
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- WastingMyTime89 4y agoYou can as I do at the same time think that the war in Ukraine is a scandalous act for which Russia is to blame and that NATO policies since the fall of the Berlin Wall have been poorly thought out and mostly detrimental to security in Europe. It’s not an either or. In the same way, I believe that Russia should bear the long term consequences of the war but that the constant delivery of advanced weapons without pushing Ukraine and Russia to negotiate ending the conflict is mostly a cynical geopolitical play allowing the USA to weaken one of his opponent at the expense of foreign lives. The world is not black and white and standing on the side which seems morally right doesn’t mean you are not exposed yourself to propaganda.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 4y agoI wish the defense industry and government agencies paid FAANG salaries.
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoIf Mark Zuckerberg spent a lifetime writing COBOL to interface with a 1972 missile silo door control panel, we'd certainly be doing well. Bonus points if his manager is someone like Boris Johnson.
- jessaustin 4y agoThe office parties would have been wild...
- vibrolax 4y agoI wish FAANG paid government and defense industry salaries. Then our best and brightest might be engaged in something other than advertising and social engineering.
- xtian 4y agoYou don’t think the government and defense industry are engaging in social engineering?
- eternalban 4y agoI always assumed Google and Facebook are just privatized components of total information awareness program. So to answer your question, Google makes making spookie systems cool and profitable. Without them, the spookie systems would need to be built and deployed by 3 letter 'alphabet' type agencies and your local area geek may not be able to handle that much cognitive dissonance.
- vibrolax 4y agoYes, but it's not 90%+ of their business.
- BurningFrog 4y ago> ...things that will hopefully never be used, and if they are, for death. This is a deep and important misunderstanding of weapons. According to this argument, the uncountable trillions spent of the US nuclear arsenal was wasted, since it was never used. In reality the main use for most weapons is deterrent!! If you have enough weapons standing around, you can avoid war, and the weapons have produced life!
- adhesive_wombat 4y agoIndeed, which is why it can't happen. But if you didn't need the deterrent, what then? That's the hypothetical (note "on all sides"), not sack in military spending unilaterally and hope for the best.
- WillPostForFood 4y agoUntil human nature changes you always need a deterrent.
- echelon 4y ago> It's an incredible waste. The best and brightest slaving lifetimes away for things that will hopefully never be used, and if they are, for death. Ukraine wishes they had our defenses. As do many states. Our military expenditures keep not only ourselves safe, but also our allies and trade partners. The default for all evolved life on this planet is to harness the energy of other systems. Humans are no different. Pretending the world was ever or will ever be at peace is a self-delusion. Strength keeps aggressors at bay. Nature naturally evolves along these lines.
- saberience 4y agoThe money spent by the US on defence for the actual utility provided is WAY WAY WAY out of line by an order of magnitude. Most of the money is simply wasted. And in terms of "defence," all a country really needs is nukes and you will never be invaded again. All the extra shit like 100s of overpriced F35, stealth destroyers etc, are all wasted money, better spent on things adding social cohesion or a more education populace.
- FredPret 4y agoThere's no other way for a civilization made up by independent intelligent entities to shake out. Conflict is an inevitable result of having multiple viewpoints and priorities, which is an inevitable result of having more than one human. All those brilliant people making deadlier weapons are saving lives by making non-violent conflict cheaper and better than violent conflict.