4 ms·

Wake up, the people in power are corrupt regardless of their political orientation. There are no saints in politics. This has been true since times immemorial w

by jack_pp 3mo ago

Wake up, the people in power are corrupt regardless of their political orientation. There are no saints in politics. This has been true since times immemorial with few exceptions.

peepee1982 3mo ago
People have a series of rationalizations. People say for example that science and technology have their own logic, that they are in fact autonomous. This particular rationalization is profoundly false. It is not true that science marches on in defiance of human will, independent of human will, that just is not the case. But it is comfortable, as I said: it leads to the position that "if I don't do it, someone else will." Of course if one takes that as an ethical principle then obviously it can serve as a license to do anything at all. "People will be murdered; if I don't do it, someone else will." "Women will be raped; if I don't do it, someone else will." That is just a license for violence. Other people say, and I think this is a widely used rationalization, that fundamentally the tools we work on are "mere" tools; This means that whether they get use for good or evil depends on the person who ultimately buys them and so on. There's nothing bad about working in computer vision, for example. Computer vision may very well some day be used to heal people who would otherwise die. Of course, it could also be used to guide missiles, cruise missiles for example, to their destination, and all that. You see, the technology itself is neutral and value-free and it just depends how one uses it. And besides -- consistent with that -- we can't know, we scientists cannot know how it is going to be used. So therefore we have no responsibility. Well, that is false. It is true that a computer, for example, can be used for good or evil. It is true that a helicopter can be used as a gunship and it can also be used to rescue people from a mountain pass. And if the question arises of how a specific device is going to be used, in what I call an abstract ideal society, then one might very well say one cannot know. But we live in a concrete society, [and] with concrete social and historical circumstances and political realities in this society, it is perfectly obvious that when something like a computer is invented, then it is going to be adopted will be for military purposes. It follows from the concrete realities in which we live, it does not follow from pure logic. But we're not living in an abstract society, we're living in the society in which we in fact live. If you look at the enormous fruits of human genius that mankind has developed in the last 50 years, atomic energy and rocketry and flying to the moon and coherent light, and it goes on and on and on -- and then it turns out that every one of these triumphs is used primarily in military terms. So it is not reasonable for a scientist or technologist to insist that he or she does not know -- or cannot know -- how it is going to be used. -- Joseph Weizenbaum
pjerem 3mo ago
That's the worst excuse to be non-political. I hate most politicians, but you can't just act like they are equally harmful. Some politicians are way, way more harmful than the others, even the corrupted ones.
- jack_pp 3mo ago
  there is enough corruption and evil in politics for me to just refuse to play the game, even the game you suggest of choosing the least evil of two clearly evil options. If you try to play that game your mind gets hijacked like all the political discussion in this commend section. Thinking you are fighting the good fight when you're just siding with evil either way you lean. Want to bring real change to the world? Fix the stuff you can, go out there in your local community and volunteer. Commenting on the internet won't do anything, neither is getting into political arguments over dinner with acquintances.
  - xiaoyu2006 3mo ago
    Not playing the politics game is also a political stances. There is no way to avoid it.
touwer 3mo ago
Not true. And an excuse for allowing all corruption because 'it's just like that'. There are a lot of non-corrupt politicians. You just have to look a bit because mostly they don't yell as loud as the corrupt ones
- jack_pp 3mo ago
  I, personally, have no power to allow or disallow corruption in any way shape or form. Shouting on the internet is not disallowing corruption. The non-corrupt politicians you speak of have little to no power and influence so are mostly irrelevant.
KaiserPro 3mo ago
"Oh what can be done!?" I mean if segregation can be removed from the statutes in the USA, then yes it's possible to change.
oblio 3mo ago
This is the worst approach to politics. I would use harsher words. Yes, people are corrupt. The world isn't binary. Some people are more corrupt than others. Otherwise Argentina would be Germany and Brazil the US. People matter and differences matter. In politics a smart person chooses the lesser evil. Intelligent people don't vote saints, they vote for people that burn their house down less often.
- jack_pp 3mo ago
  politics is a classic double bind where the only winning move is not to play
  - oblio 3mo ago
    Ah, you're a hobbit, I see? https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcqo6lloZ41qgzdhjo15_r1_250.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcqo6lloZ41qgzdhjo15_r1_2... "Keep your nose out of trouble and no trouble will come to you". I used to be a hobbit, too, when I was 19. It does NOT work. Politics is everywhere, we're social animals. The only winning move is to do whatever we can to protect democracy and pick the least damaging idiot, and if we accidentally pick the most damaging idiot, get them out of power as quickly as we can.
    - jack_pp 3mo ago
      and what has come of your new stance since you renounced being a hobbit? I'm not a hobbit, I don't particularly stay out of trouble, I fight injustice where I can, practically. Following political narratives and having political arguments with other people who will take no action except vote does not bring real change. Changing someone's political stance is nigh impossible, but even if you do manage to do it to a few people, they won't become zealots like you and propagate the change. You might need a couple hundred hours of discourse to change a single person's mind and in the grand scheme of things, 1-2 people are insignificant.
      - oblio 3mo ago

by jack_pp 3mo ago

Wake up, the people in power are corrupt regardless of their political orientation. There are no saints in politics. This has been true since times immemorial with few exceptions.

peepee1982 3mo ago

People have a series of rationalizations. People say for example that science and technology have their own logic, that they are in fact autonomous. This particular rationalization is profoundly false. It is not true that science marches on in defiance of human will, independent of human will, that just is not the case. But it is comfortable, as I said: it leads to the position that "if I don't do it, someone else will." Of course if one takes that as an ethical principle then obviously it can serve as a license to do anything at all. "People will be murdered; if I don't do it, someone else will." "Women will be raped; if I don't do it, someone else will." That is just a license for violence. Other people say, and I think this is a widely used rationalization, that fundamentally the tools we work on are "mere" tools; This means that whether they get use for good or evil depends on the person who ultimately buys them and so on. There's nothing bad about working in computer vision, for example. Computer vision may very well some day be used to heal people who would otherwise die. Of course, it could also be used to guide missiles, cruise missiles for example, to their destination, and all that. You see, the technology itself is neutral and value-free and it just depends how one uses it. And besides -- consistent with that -- we can't know, we scientists cannot know how it is going to be used. So therefore we have no responsibility. Well, that is false. It is true that a computer, for example, can be used for good or evil. It is true that a helicopter can be used as a gunship and it can also be used to rescue people from a mountain pass. And if the question arises of how a specific device is going to be used, in what I call an abstract ideal society, then one might very well say one cannot know. But we live in a concrete society, [and] with concrete social and historical circumstances and political realities in this society, it is perfectly obvious that when something like a computer is invented, then it is going to be adopted will be for military purposes. It follows from the concrete realities in which we live, it does not follow from pure logic. But we're not living in an abstract society, we're living in the society in which we in fact live. If you look at the enormous fruits of human genius that mankind has developed in the last 50 years, atomic energy and rocketry and flying to the moon and coherent light, and it goes on and on and on -- and then it turns out that every one of these triumphs is used primarily in military terms. So it is not reasonable for a scientist or technologist to insist that he or she does not know -- or cannot know -- how it is going to be used. -- Joseph Weizenbaum

pjerem 3mo ago

That's the worst excuse to be non-political. I hate most politicians, but you can't just act like they are equally harmful. Some politicians are way, way more harmful than the others, even the corrupted ones.

jack_pp 3mo ago
there is enough corruption and evil in politics for me to just refuse to play the game, even the game you suggest of choosing the least evil of two clearly evil options. If you try to play that game your mind gets hijacked like all the political discussion in this commend section. Thinking you are fighting the good fight when you're just siding with evil either way you lean. Want to bring real change to the world? Fix the stuff you can, go out there in your local community and volunteer. Commenting on the internet won't do anything, neither is getting into political arguments over dinner with acquintances.
- xiaoyu2006 3mo ago
  Not playing the politics game is also a political stances. There is no way to avoid it.

touwer 3mo ago

Not true. And an excuse for allowing all corruption because 'it's just like that'. There are a lot of non-corrupt politicians. You just have to look a bit because mostly they don't yell as loud as the corrupt ones

jack_pp 3mo ago
I, personally, have no power to allow or disallow corruption in any way shape or form. Shouting on the internet is not disallowing corruption. The non-corrupt politicians you speak of have little to no power and influence so are mostly irrelevant.

KaiserPro 3mo ago

"Oh what can be done!?" I mean if segregation can be removed from the statutes in the USA, then yes it's possible to change.

oblio 3mo ago

This is the worst approach to politics. I would use harsher words. Yes, people are corrupt. The world isn't binary. Some people are more corrupt than others. Otherwise Argentina would be Germany and Brazil the US. People matter and differences matter. In politics a smart person chooses the lesser evil. Intelligent people don't vote saints, they vote for people that burn their house down less often.

jack_pp 3mo ago
politics is a classic double bind where the only winning move is not to play
- oblio 3mo ago
  Ah, you're a hobbit, I see? https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcqo6lloZ41qgzdhjo15_r1_250.gifv https://64.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcqo6lloZ41qgzdhjo15_r1_2... "Keep your nose out of trouble and no trouble will come to you". I used to be a hobbit, too, when I was 19. It does NOT work. Politics is everywhere, we're social animals. The only winning move is to do whatever we can to protect democracy and pick the least damaging idiot, and if we accidentally pick the most damaging idiot, get them out of power as quickly as we can.
  - jack_pp 3mo ago
    and what has come of your new stance since you renounced being a hobbit? I'm not a hobbit, I don't particularly stay out of trouble, I fight injustice where I can, practically. Following political narratives and having political arguments with other people who will take no action except vote does not bring real change. Changing someone's political stance is nigh impossible, but even if you do manage to do it to a few people, they won't become zealots like you and propagate the change. You might need a couple hundred hours of discourse to change a single person's mind and in the grand scheme of things, 1-2 people are insignificant.
    - oblio 3mo ago