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This is why I never understood people resigning in protest such as was the case with Google’s military contracts. You simply assure that the culture change happ

by orasis 3y ago

This is why I never understood people resigning in protest such as was the case with Google’s military contracts. You simply assure that the culture change happens more swiftly.

komali2 3y ago
There's always other companies. Plus sometimes you just gotta stick to your values. For the Google military contracts it makes even more sense: the protest resignation isn't just a virtue signal, it's also just refusing to contribute to the military.
- busterarm 3y ago
  If you want to deter military action involving your country, contributing to its defense is probably the best thing that you can do. Unless you're not actually the best and brightest that your country can offer. If you believe that your country offers value (compared to the rest of the world), you should take any opportunities you can to serve.
  - 6gvONxR4sf7o 3y ago
    Defense and offense don’t seem easily separated when it comes to military technology.
    - busterarm 3y ago
      That's always an issue with weapons, but if you opt out then you don't have them when you might need them. It's a dangerous world out there. Luckily for us, technology is still more-often used for good. Explosives can kill your enemies, but they can also cut paths through mountains and bring together communities. IMO, the virtue signal where people refuse to work on defense technology is just self-identifying with the worst kind of cynicism about human beings and signaling poor reasoning skills. The Manhattan Project, which had the stated purpose of building and deploying nuclear _weapons_, employed our most brilliant minds at the time and only two people quit -- and only one because of an ethics concern. Joseph Rotblat left the project after the Nazis were already defeated and because defeating the Nazis was the only reason he'd signed on. Also this is disputed by some who say that he was more concerned about finding family members who survived the Holocaust...
      - Aerbil313 3y ago
        > Luckily for us, technology is still more-often used for good. When you are on the other end of the cannon, or your heart is beating with those who are, you tend to not say that. Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Afghanistan…
    - busterarm 3y ago
      We're in a really privileged position in human civilization where most of the species is far removed from the banal violence of nature. You're lucky if you only need weapons to defend yourself against predators. You're far less lucky if you need weapons to defend yourself because the neighboring mountain village's crops failed and their herds died. You're less lucky if you don't speak the same language as them and they outnumber you three to one and are already 4 days starving. You're less lucky that they're already 4 days starving, wielding farm tools, running down the hills at you, crazed and screaming.
      - everforward 3y ago
        Sure, but the point is that those same tools that you can use to fend off the neighboring village work equally well to invade the neighboring village for their prosperous farm land. You will not be the one that gets to decide how those tools are used. There's a line of thought that having advanced weaponry inherently promotes its use, because who's going to stop you? How gung-ho do you think the US would have been about going to war in Iraq if it weren't for the billion dollar tanks and aircraft and bombs?
        busterarm 3y ago
        Just about any technology advancement ever has weapons potential. If you want to take that reasoning, just quiver in fear at home and not develop anything. You have to be optimistic about humanity.
        Aerbil313 3y ago
        I disagree. All technological development changes human societies and imposes its rules upon them and rules over them, not the other way around. The combination of technology and human nature is an unstoppable deterministic force, one whose effects are so easily predicted when traced from… invention of cannons (?) in hindsight. No modern (organization-dependent) technology should have ever been developed. The people lived happier, more mentally healthy and more fulfilling lives despite living in worse material conditions and the lifespan isn’t that bad when you factor out child mortality anyway. Turns out human brain can (actually even designed to) easily deal with bad material conditions if it’s not messed up with thousand addictions, mouthbreathing, sedentary life and smartphones. Saying this as an aspiring software engineer. I use NixOS, and rewrite things in Rust. It’s not some unga-bunga speaking. Read some Ted Kaczynski.
  - komali2 3y ago
    > If you want to deter military action involving your country, contributing to its defense is probably the best thing that you can do. Given that Google is an American company, do you believe contributing to the American Department of "Defense" increases, or decreases, the amount of military action involving the USA? The American military isn't called "world police" for nothing, and just like the cops they're sticking their noses where they don't belong and making things worse. I can understand why people would want no part in furthering global violence and destitution. > If you believe that your country offers value (compared to the rest of the world), you should take any opportunities you can to serve. Really? There's an obligation to further the American global ambition through contributing militarily? You can't think of any other way to spread American culture and values? To share the bounty of American wealth?
    - busterarm 3y ago
      We already have nation states and wannabe nation states that take shots at us when they feel like the opportunity is there, despite us being the dominant military around the world. As does France, who has been a leading military power for longer than we have. That's what having a funded and functional defense is all about -- making other entities not think that the opportunity is there. I think the planet has relatively finite resources and that I'm god damned lucky to have been born into a nation with the ability to secure resources for itself. I enjoy my quality of life a great deal and would like to maintain it. At a minimum. Before helping others. If you're the type of person who thinks we should just give up this position by not adequately defending it through military and technology investment, I would prefer that you just expatriate yourself now rather than let some other ascendant nation dictate our future and our quality of life. If you're the kind of person who feels strongly for the plight of, for example, the Palestinians, you should recognize that the only way to deter those kinds of outcomes is to establish the means to establish and maintain sovereignty. That requires a combination of force and manpower.
      - komali2 3y ago
        > If you're the type of person who thinks we should just give up this position by not adequately defending it through military and technology investment, I would prefer that you just expatriate yourself now rather than let some other ascendant nation dictate our future and our quality of life. But I thought you said if we want to fix something we should do so from within the system? I'm interested in ending American imperialism, by your logic isn't the best place to do so from within the USA? > We already have nation states and wannabe nation states that take shots at us when they feel like the opportunity is there From which nation state do you feel an existential threat? I haven't heard "they defend our freedoms" in a very, very long time, and I thought we all knew it was ironic. > I think the planet has relatively finite resources I'm curious about this viewpoint, because it seems to necessarily imply that the human race will simply die out when those resources (and those of the surrounding solar system) are exhausted. Is sustainability just, not a concept in this worldview? > That's what having a funded and functional defense is all about -- making other entities not think that the opportunity is there. It seems in the case of the USA, the "functional defense" is more often used to destabilize other nations, and arm terrorists that then turn around and attack the USA. It's really interesting you brought up Palestinian liberation as an example, because really one of the only reasons Israel is able to maintain its apartheid state and repression of the Palestinians is because of USA aid. In your understanding, both the Israelis and the Palestinians should arm up and up and up until they're both pointing nukes at eachother, correct? That's the only pathway to peace?

by orasis 3y ago

This is why I never understood people resigning in protest such as was the case with Google’s military contracts. You simply assure that the culture change happens more swiftly.

komali2 3y ago

There's always other companies. Plus sometimes you just gotta stick to your values. For the Google military contracts it makes even more sense: the protest resignation isn't just a virtue signal, it's also just refusing to contribute to the military.

busterarm 3y ago
If you want to deter military action involving your country, contributing to its defense is probably the best thing that you can do. Unless you're not actually the best and brightest that your country can offer. If you believe that your country offers value (compared to the rest of the world), you should take any opportunities you can to serve.
- 6gvONxR4sf7o 3y ago
  Defense and offense don’t seem easily separated when it comes to military technology.
  - busterarm 3y ago
    That's always an issue with weapons, but if you opt out then you don't have them when you might need them. It's a dangerous world out there. Luckily for us, technology is still more-often used for good. Explosives can kill your enemies, but they can also cut paths through mountains and bring together communities. IMO, the virtue signal where people refuse to work on defense technology is just self-identifying with the worst kind of cynicism about human beings and signaling poor reasoning skills. The Manhattan Project, which had the stated purpose of building and deploying nuclear _weapons_, employed our most brilliant minds at the time and only two people quit -- and only one because of an ethics concern. Joseph Rotblat left the project after the Nazis were already defeated and because defeating the Nazis was the only reason he'd signed on. Also this is disputed by some who say that he was more concerned about finding family members who survived the Holocaust...
    - Aerbil313 3y ago
      > Luckily for us, technology is still more-often used for good. When you are on the other end of the cannon, or your heart is beating with those who are, you tend to not say that. Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Afghanistan…
  - busterarm 3y ago
    We're in a really privileged position in human civilization where most of the species is far removed from the banal violence of nature. You're lucky if you only need weapons to defend yourself against predators. You're far less lucky if you need weapons to defend yourself because the neighboring mountain village's crops failed and their herds died. You're less lucky if you don't speak the same language as them and they outnumber you three to one and are already 4 days starving. You're less lucky that they're already 4 days starving, wielding farm tools, running down the hills at you, crazed and screaming.
    - everforward 3y ago
      Sure, but the point is that those same tools that you can use to fend off the neighboring village work equally well to invade the neighboring village for their prosperous farm land. You will not be the one that gets to decide how those tools are used. There's a line of thought that having advanced weaponry inherently promotes its use, because who's going to stop you? How gung-ho do you think the US would have been about going to war in Iraq if it weren't for the billion dollar tanks and aircraft and bombs?
      - busterarm 3y ago
        Just about any technology advancement ever has weapons potential. If you want to take that reasoning, just quiver in fear at home and not develop anything. You have to be optimistic about humanity.
        Aerbil313 3y ago
        I disagree. All technological development changes human societies and imposes its rules upon them and rules over them, not the other way around. The combination of technology and human nature is an unstoppable deterministic force, one whose effects are so easily predicted when traced from… invention of cannons (?) in hindsight. No modern (organization-dependent) technology should have ever been developed. The people lived happier, more mentally healthy and more fulfilling lives despite living in worse material conditions and the lifespan isn’t that bad when you factor out child mortality anyway. Turns out human brain can (actually even designed to) easily deal with bad material conditions if it’s not messed up with thousand addictions, mouthbreathing, sedentary life and smartphones. Saying this as an aspiring software engineer. I use NixOS, and rewrite things in Rust. It’s not some unga-bunga speaking. Read some Ted Kaczynski.
- komali2 3y ago
  > If you want to deter military action involving your country, contributing to its defense is probably the best thing that you can do. Given that Google is an American company, do you believe contributing to the American Department of "Defense" increases, or decreases, the amount of military action involving the USA? The American military isn't called "world police" for nothing, and just like the cops they're sticking their noses where they don't belong and making things worse. I can understand why people would want no part in furthering global violence and destitution. > If you believe that your country offers value (compared to the rest of the world), you should take any opportunities you can to serve. Really? There's an obligation to further the American global ambition through contributing militarily? You can't think of any other way to spread American culture and values? To share the bounty of American wealth?
  - busterarm 3y ago
    We already have nation states and wannabe nation states that take shots at us when they feel like the opportunity is there, despite us being the dominant military around the world. As does France, who has been a leading military power for longer than we have. That's what having a funded and functional defense is all about -- making other entities not think that the opportunity is there. I think the planet has relatively finite resources and that I'm god damned lucky to have been born into a nation with the ability to secure resources for itself. I enjoy my quality of life a great deal and would like to maintain it. At a minimum. Before helping others. If you're the type of person who thinks we should just give up this position by not adequately defending it through military and technology investment, I would prefer that you just expatriate yourself now rather than let some other ascendant nation dictate our future and our quality of life. If you're the kind of person who feels strongly for the plight of, for example, the Palestinians, you should recognize that the only way to deter those kinds of outcomes is to establish the means to establish and maintain sovereignty. That requires a combination of force and manpower.
    - komali2 3y ago
      > If you're the type of person who thinks we should just give up this position by not adequately defending it through military and technology investment, I would prefer that you just expatriate yourself now rather than let some other ascendant nation dictate our future and our quality of life. But I thought you said if we want to fix something we should do so from within the system? I'm interested in ending American imperialism, by your logic isn't the best place to do so from within the USA? > We already have nation states and wannabe nation states that take shots at us when they feel like the opportunity is there From which nation state do you feel an existential threat? I haven't heard "they defend our freedoms" in a very, very long time, and I thought we all knew it was ironic. > I think the planet has relatively finite resources I'm curious about this viewpoint, because it seems to necessarily imply that the human race will simply die out when those resources (and those of the surrounding solar system) are exhausted. Is sustainability just, not a concept in this worldview? > That's what having a funded and functional defense is all about -- making other entities not think that the opportunity is there. It seems in the case of the USA, the "functional defense" is more often used to destabilize other nations, and arm terrorists that then turn around and attack the USA. It's really interesting you brought up Palestinian liberation as an example, because really one of the only reasons Israel is able to maintain its apartheid state and repression of the Palestinians is because of USA aid. In your understanding, both the Israelis and the Palestinians should arm up and up and up until they're both pointing nukes at eachother, correct? That's the only pathway to peace?