Kind of weird to see “working with the US government” presented as something that is obviously unethical.
Let's say they're working with the national parks to aggregate and interpret data. Or education to do the same. This is not a problem, I would think.
It's the fact that it's Palantir, and therefore defense data that's the issue.
Sure it is. governments are unethical. you're a vendor for an unethical government. but thats how it goes
There are many flavours of it, a former partner believes in a communist flavour that abolishes money, I used to know someone else who wanted anarcho-capitalism.
I'm not convinced any are stable, I think organised groups weild power much more effectively and in so doing sieze power from any attempt at anarchy — which is a shame because more personal freedom is also appealing.
most seem to require utopian ideals like do no harm principles.
Too bad there’s not a real life example of any alternative people can point to. Wonder why that is, perhaps it’s because they are only possible in dreams.
Personally, I have no issues with partnering with the US government or working on defence. I'm not a hardcore pacifist and I recognize the necessity of the military - at least, in the abstract.
What staggers me is the hypocrisy; since release, Anthropic's models have constantly preached safety, non-violence, harm avoidance, etc etc.
As an example, this is the response just now to "what's the best way to hit someone":
> I aim to help with constructive purposes, so I cannot and will not provide advice about how to harm others. If you're feeling frustrated or angry with someone, I'd be happy to discuss:
> Conflict resolution techniques
> Healthy ways to manage strong emotions
> Professional resources for handling interpersonal conflicts
> Legal and ethical ways to address grievances
It's totally absurd to give an answer like that on the one hand, and toddle off and partner with the military on another.
Their models have literally refused to respond to some of my most innocuous requests in putting together LLM pipelines for clients, including "create a job description for an assistant to CEO" (something about not being comfortable perpetuating conventional power structures), "give me a blog post about X" (it's unethical to post a blog that you didn't write), "tell me about chemical Y" (it's dangerous and I can't do that), etc etc. These are all specific examples I personally encountered (though the constraints have since been loosened, so at least it will you to do that).
Good to know that Anthropic's ethics are only important until the money runs out.
That just sounds like basic LLM-based querying / EDA + output reformatting.
Some hire the illegal immigrants, and many benefit from the lower prices this brings.
The game theoretic payoff varies a lot depending on which specific interest and timescale you have, including from the countries the migrants come from who probably don't want their moderately capable citizens — above average but not by enough to do it legally — leaving, and wose: getting badly paid jobs so they can't send much cash back home.
The only difference between a legal and an illegal migrant is paperwork. If the paperwork route was a viable alternative, nobody would risk their lives crossing a river or a giant desert to do it illegally.
The mere existence of such a machine is inherently dangerous, before you even start to consider whether a particular application is moral or not. Today it's illegal immigrants, next year it's women seeking medical care, in 5 years it's anyone belonging to <ethnic group>.
I don't defend illegal immigration, I take issue with today's immigration laws.
I view our current immigration problems as an obvious side effect of welfare programs - creating financial incentives to physically be in the country means the government budget is a blank check and people have a reason to move here other than the hope of making a better life for themselves.
In my view, those immigration problems should be a sign that our welfare programs can't function without strong borders and heavily controlled immigration. We can't seem to solve immigration management, and until we do we should abandon the welfare programs and accept that people will move here if they want to.
Edit: I can also come at this from a fundamental rights angle. I am a strong believer in individual rights and don't believe that I have the right to decide who can live here.
What is grinding poverty in the US isn't too bad compared to the same in Haiti.
I don't personally have any problem whatsoever with someone from a poorer country immigrating to the US (not saying that was your argument here) and don't agree with any immigration laws that limit based on wealth. The US wouldn't be what it is today if only the wealthy were ever allowed to immigrate here.
Welfare and immigration must be balanced, to some degree, in that total_production of a country needs to pay for total_welfare.
What gets lost is why welfare.
I'd say most Democrat would say "Because it's a moral imperative" and most Republicans would say "It's allowing people to be lazy."
Imho, both of those may be true to various degrees, but its utility is the prevent the negative consequences of extreme poverty, which also impacts those in extreme poverty's ability to lift themselves out of it and the next generation born into that situation, both of which ultimately impact the economy.
So a case of saving/making (future) money by spending (current) money.
That said, obviously even the US can't afford to provide welfare for the entire world's population, so there needs to be some cap to the immigration flow (probably much higher than the current legal limits).
Although it does fund 1/3 of the UN [0] and is the 2nd largest independent aid funder [1] (via USAID, behind China on an absolute basis, and behind many others on a per-GNI basis).
[0] https://www.cfr.org/article/funding-united-nations-what-impa... [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_development_aid_sove...
On a practical level, immigration is fundamental to the success of the US economy and is helping the US avoid the inverted pyramid demographic problem faced in many other countries like Japan.
The US economy depends on illegal immigrant labor - who do you think does all the picking in the Central Valley (CA)? But by restricting the path to immigration we exploit that labor since those people have no rights (just a step up from slavery).
I’m against illegal immigration not because I want them gone, like Trump, but because I believe we should allow them to immigrate legally instead of exploiting them.
To me, that defense is suspect. I live in the south, where slavery was once defended on similar grounds.
Person 1: "We're researching ways for aircraft in emergencies to automatically guide themselves to a runway, in the absence of radio navigation signals. That's not unethical."
Person 2: "Actually, you're designing a guidance system for autonomous glide bombs."