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Why don't terrorist groups hire the best chemical engineers to engineer chemical weapons? Or the best bioscientists to engineer the deadliest plagues? Or the be

Why don't terrorist groups hire the best chemical engineers to engineer chemical weapons? Or the best bioscientists to engineer the deadliest plagues? Or the best hackers to engineer the best computer viruses? Or not even the best, just average/competent enough scientists and engineers? Phrased a little differently, would you accept being paid a life-changing amount of money in exchange for anonymously engineering a deadly threat to some people far from home and knowing you could get away with it? Would you let your morals stop you?

__MatrixMan__ 4y ago
Given that there are many people who work for defense contractors, and for middling pay, I think we can safely say that plenty of people would not let their morals stop them.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- filoleg 4y ago
  I don't think the comparison here is valid even in the slightest, and I am not even talking about it from the "terrorist groups and defense contractors are not morally equal" angle at all. I simply think that the venn diagram of people willing to do software dev work for a defense contractor like Boeing or Raytheon and people willing to do software dev work for the cartels/terrorist groups is not even close to approaching a full circle. Sure, most people willing to do software dev work for the cartels/terrorist groups are probably totally morally ok with doing work for a defense contractor. But I am willing to bet that most people willing to work for a defense contractor will not feel morally alright working for the cartels/terrorist groups even in the slightest.
  - lupire 4y ago
    The "terrorist" thinks they are defense contractor and that Raytheon is the terrorist. It's fully symmetric. The difference is that many or most won't cross borders to work for the opposing team. ISIS has many engineers.
    - kortilla 4y ago
      Maybe for some of the terrorist groups, but it’s certainly not the case for people working for the cartels. There is no “both sides” argument to working for a group that just wants to get filthy rich using brutal violence, bribery, and disregard for the downsides of hard drug addiction. The cartels don’t have a recruiting story of bringing justice to the oppressed, etc. It’s just opportunity for money and power for people with limited opportunities otherwise. Totally orthogonal to recruiting for “mission focused” orgs like terrorist groups.
      - thephyber 4y ago
        > The cartels don’t have a recruiting story of bringing justice to the oppressed, Two points. You pivoted from terrorists to cartels. You clearly don’t realize that cartels actually get their info and their purpose from protecting (or at least doing enough visible work to appear to be protecting) the average person in their territory. Sure, not all cartels work this way, but even if not initially, they eventually buy their info this way. And, yes, terrorist groups absolutely do try to claim they are fighting for justice. They are just targeting a different demographic than you have in your mind. The children of parents killed by US defense contractor weapons. The religious zealots convinced of whatever religious transgression. The clash of values. There are plenty of political platforms, and they all can be recruiting stories.
        kortilla 4y ago
        > You pivoted from terrorists to cartel No I didn’t. Read the thread. It lumped both together.
- JackFr 4y ago
  Can we somehow find a middle ground between saying “Thank you for your service” every time we see a uniform and writing off the entire military and defense industry as immoral?
  - lupire 4y ago
    "Thank you for your service" seems like a good middle ground. The people in service aren't the ones making the strategic decisions of who to attack.
  - pessimizer 4y ago
    Maybe for a hypothetical military or defense industry, but not for the ones that we have, who will tear through five children to get to one "terrorist." edit: this is even a problem for people who write FOSS (unfortunately leading to some of them putting moral clauses in licenses), never mind those taking a check from some of the worst people in the world.
  - Spooky23 4y ago
    It’s a projection of guilt, immaturity or ignorance. Everything is awful, except for what pays your mortgage. The world is about shades of grey, not black and white. That applies to all peddlers of moral indignation. The most strident patriots are usually pasty old men who bear no cost for their actions.
JackFr 4y ago
Non-state actors typically don’t have life changing amounts of money.
- markvdb 4y ago
  Some do, but even if they wouldn't, there's still state terrorism.
marcinzm 4y ago
Even if you were fine with it in theory there is a massive risk to it in practice. In essence you're giving up most legal protections (since you've got as much to lose as anyone else if the police catch you) while working with people who likely have no moral issues with killing you. Will they pay you or will they kidnap your family and cut off someone's toe every time you complain?

__MatrixMan__ 4y ago

Given that there are many people who work for defense contractors, and for middling pay, I think we can safely say that plenty of people would not let their morals stop them.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
filoleg 4y ago
I don't think the comparison here is valid even in the slightest, and I am not even talking about it from the "terrorist groups and defense contractors are not morally equal" angle at all. I simply think that the venn diagram of people willing to do software dev work for a defense contractor like Boeing or Raytheon and people willing to do software dev work for the cartels/terrorist groups is not even close to approaching a full circle. Sure, most people willing to do software dev work for the cartels/terrorist groups are probably totally morally ok with doing work for a defense contractor. But I am willing to bet that most people willing to work for a defense contractor will not feel morally alright working for the cartels/terrorist groups even in the slightest.
- lupire 4y ago
  The "terrorist" thinks they are defense contractor and that Raytheon is the terrorist. It's fully symmetric. The difference is that many or most won't cross borders to work for the opposing team. ISIS has many engineers.
  - kortilla 4y ago
    Maybe for some of the terrorist groups, but it’s certainly not the case for people working for the cartels. There is no “both sides” argument to working for a group that just wants to get filthy rich using brutal violence, bribery, and disregard for the downsides of hard drug addiction. The cartels don’t have a recruiting story of bringing justice to the oppressed, etc. It’s just opportunity for money and power for people with limited opportunities otherwise. Totally orthogonal to recruiting for “mission focused” orgs like terrorist groups.
    - thephyber 4y ago
      > The cartels don’t have a recruiting story of bringing justice to the oppressed, Two points. You pivoted from terrorists to cartels. You clearly don’t realize that cartels actually get their info and their purpose from protecting (or at least doing enough visible work to appear to be protecting) the average person in their territory. Sure, not all cartels work this way, but even if not initially, they eventually buy their info this way. And, yes, terrorist groups absolutely do try to claim they are fighting for justice. They are just targeting a different demographic than you have in your mind. The children of parents killed by US defense contractor weapons. The religious zealots convinced of whatever religious transgression. The clash of values. There are plenty of political platforms, and they all can be recruiting stories.
      - kortilla 4y ago
        > You pivoted from terrorists to cartel No I didn’t. Read the thread. It lumped both together.
JackFr 4y ago
Can we somehow find a middle ground between saying “Thank you for your service” every time we see a uniform and writing off the entire military and defense industry as immoral?
- lupire 4y ago
  "Thank you for your service" seems like a good middle ground. The people in service aren't the ones making the strategic decisions of who to attack.
- pessimizer 4y ago
  Maybe for a hypothetical military or defense industry, but not for the ones that we have, who will tear through five children to get to one "terrorist." edit: this is even a problem for people who write FOSS (unfortunately leading to some of them putting moral clauses in licenses), never mind those taking a check from some of the worst people in the world.
- Spooky23 4y ago
  It’s a projection of guilt, immaturity or ignorance. Everything is awful, except for what pays your mortgage. The world is about shades of grey, not black and white. That applies to all peddlers of moral indignation. The most strident patriots are usually pasty old men who bear no cost for their actions.

JackFr 4y ago

Non-state actors typically don’t have life changing amounts of money.

markvdb 4y ago
Some do, but even if they wouldn't, there's still state terrorism.

marcinzm 4y ago

Even if you were fine with it in theory there is a massive risk to it in practice. In essence you're giving up most legal protections (since you've got as much to lose as anyone else if the police catch you) while working with people who likely have no moral issues with killing you. Will they pay you or will they kidnap your family and cut off someone's toe every time you complain?