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Comment by blitzar | Hacker News Reader

> Researchers at Amazon had used a series of prompts to get Anthropic’s Fable 5 model to provide them with information that could be used to aid cyberattacks...

Are there going to be bans on things that could be used to aid in school shootings next?

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Canada had a school shooter that used ai tools and the public has not been informed of what happened in the chat

It's OK tho, Sam personally apologized for that oopsie.

The specific breadth of that oopsie, to recall, was that multiple human reviewers recommended escalation to law enforcement, and were rebuffed. So the system _almost_ worked except for an unforced error and people died as a direct result. Oopsie, indeed.

> Are there going to be bans on things that could be used to aid in school shootings next?

No.

Because us Americans don’t care about school shootings.

I’d rather the government invest in S&P500 going higher.

You overestimate how many people actually care about mass shootings in America.

I think you underestimate how many people actually care about mass shootings.

> I think you underestimate how many people actually care about mass shootings.

Less than 1% of the population, that’s for sure.

You remember the last protest about school shootings? Neither do I.

I get what you’re saying but in the last 20 years can you think of any mass protest that accomplished anything substantial? I don’t really blame people for giving up on it as a tool for change. TBH only truly effective one I can think of would be Jan 6

I can, just not in the US [0]. I always presumed this is linked to the health care being provided by employers rather than having a more robust safety net that allows for civil disobedience without having to fear existential risks. However, I also can’t forget that the French have their safety net not as a God given right, but because they fought for it via (often not just civil) protest. Reference also the statements MLK JR made concerning the willingness of white moderates to engage in actually effective disobedience, even when their financial situation allows for such.

[0] https://thenonviolenceproject.wisc.edu/2023/06/02/recent-pro...

There are more people not on employer-provided health insurance in the US than exist in France. How does your presumption work given that fact?

I just checked and it's 54% in the US [0] vs 0% in France (cause basic public healthcare isn't tied to employment). So, unless you are referring to absolute numbers (not very helpful when comparing countries of different sizes), I'm not sure what you are referring to.

I will admit that my purely personal thesis on this front goes a bit beyond healthcare. I feel that a robust safety net, iron clad right to protest and a large, at least reasonably financially stable (meaning no existential financial fears for at least the majority of citizenry, i.e. above roughly 60% middle class for a given economy) are needed to allow for protests in such a manner that the citizenry are both capable, willing and informed sufficiently to protect their own interests and democracy as a whole. Having the right and ability to protests is needed, just as much as being comfortable enough to have the time to actually stay politically engaged (consistent financial strain being a reasonable cause for why one doesn't stay informed in my book). France or my home country of Austria (imperfect countries like any other, I will (un)happily admit) on that front are in the 65%-75% range, whereas the US appears to barely get above 50% purely by income along with higher health care costs in general and employer linked plans for as stated above the majority, so these are somewhat interlinked in my view.

Same reason, albeit less extreme, why in war-torn countries, long standing brutal dictatorships and the like, the citizenry rarely is able to create any proper action agains their oppressors, not because they are accepting of the status quo, weak, or anything of the sort, but because when one is starving and trying to help their family unit survive, even beyond the risk that action can pose, their often isn't any time to actually consider it. "A republic, if you can keep it", in my opinion is a high demand from the public. They need to have the tools, rights and resources to actively defend it. Not saying France is perfect here, but I will say that it is easy to just raise our finger at the US populous without considering the whole picture.

[0] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/portion-insured-americans-w...

Well they happen in schools and children don’t vote. If this had been a wave of senior center shootings, something would have been done a long, long time ago.

This is not a good argument. Children tend to have parents who can vote.

I see what you're saying, but I don't agree that it works this way. Parents' concerns for their children are far more self-serving than most parents claim. Consider that every "for the children" political agenda ever has nakedly ulterior motives--name one truly pro-child policy where children are directly prioritized at the expense of their parents? Consider the way that school schedules are oriented around their parents' convenience in spite of decades of studies showing the harmful health effects they have. During COVID we saw dramatic efforts to protect the elderly coupled with a push to reopen schools by parents tired of having to take care of them all day. Whatever you think of the restrictions one way or another, the prioritization of elderly was apparent throughout. These are the same parents who have repeated voted benefits for themselves at the direct expense of their children, saddling them with trillions of dollars of debt to support their own present consumption. I promise you, if seniors were regularly being gunned down like this they would have found a solution already.

Because it has moved way beyond protests. Everyone agrees that school shootings are bad. Legislation has been passed. Policies have changed. Schools have changed their security tactics. There have been years and years of meetings across the country with school administrators and boards talking about how to improve safety and navigate these issues, and then the schools themselves implementing new practices.

If you are looking around and saying that because people aren't waving sign on street corners, then nobody cares, then you have utterly missed a couple decades of dedicated efforts by many people working around these issues.

The fact that shootings still happen is tragic. But it is not because people are just shrugging and saying they don't care.

Caring with no significant action in prevention doesn’t really signal caring. Sure, it sucks, headlines get printed for a couple of months, then people forget and move on.

To put it in the most disrespectful and sad way, it looks like more people have been on the streets for Knicks games than most (any?) school shootings of the past decades.

It's just harder to get the average joe charged up to fight a battle with anything meaningful on the line. Americans are used to living relatively cushy lives where they don't sacrifice their QOL to make the lives of their countrymen better. The closest thing to that are people in the military, and it's probably been a while since the US military is improving QOL, on average.

People will continue to be complacent on multiple fronts until it absolutely comes to a violent boil. I don't really see half measures or peaceful protests changing anything. And maybe I'm pessimistic, but I think the upcoming elections will either not change enough or be strongly manipulated to maintain the status quo.

>harder to get the average joe charged up to fight a battle with anything meaningful on the line

Doesn't this imply that on average people just don't care? So, school shooting preventions are just way down in the list of "things I care about", when you have "cushy lives where nobody wants to sacrifice their QOL".

It means they don't care enough to meaningfully make sacrifices for change. To deal with school shootings is to change the constitution. The American constitution is basically wired for school shootings. To change the constitution is basically a civil war.

Things aren't binary. Many people care deeply about school shootings. But they don't have the means or power to organize to stop them and, individually, they are powerless.

They’re not binary, but when an issue persists for decades, over the course of multiple administrations, and political landscape… it shows either the country is incompetent in terms of solving an issue, or the issue is not a priority.

I wholeheartedly believe US can solve issues when it’s an important one. And thus, I think, for an average American it’s not an issue.

Decades is a very long timeframe. Countries have achieved more in shorter periods.

> I wholeheartedly believe US can solve issues when it’s an important one.

What's the last important issue in the US that was democratically resolved?

Enforcing the global use of the petro dollar is what keeps Americans living cushy lives so be careful disrespecting the military personel.

My post was not disrespectful. It was matter of fact. And if the Petro Dollar only persists by use of force or perceived force, it's probably not a sustainable system for humanity. So hopefully we can go back to a soft power maintained Petro Dollar?

I think your assumption of lack of caring is misplaced. The citizens clearly care, but have no power to do anything about it. Those in power are the ones that do not care or are paid not to care.

The author said nothing of the people but of the government itself. 12 years ago, elementary school children were slaughtered and even that wasn’t enough to ban guns.

Thoughts and prayers doesn't count as truly caring

Hate to say it but you're right. If people cared, they'd actually do something about it.

People are doing something, the issue with you two's extremely poor thinking is that lack of inaction means no one cares. What it actually represents is the massive growing disparity between the political class and average Americans.

There is >70% public support universal background checks for all firearm transactions, safe storage laws, and crisis intervention. Just the same that there is also large public support for things like public jobs programs, medicare for all, universal childcare, or free university; there is a very real obstacle that the political class in this country are adamant about stopping all progress towards better lives and not strictly caring that the elites extract more wealth or corporations get more welfare.

I'm very sorry, but I've heard that "there's large public support for X, Y, Z" for decades. If there's no real action in achieving such things, my assumption is people don't actually care about it.

Personally, when I "care about something", I try to act on it. My list is not long, and I'm very grateful that I don't have to spend a single minute of my life to think about school shootings.

You clearly missed the part about the divide between the political class and everyone else.

Most people in the US are just trying to pay rent and maybe one day save up for a house by the time they are 40-50.

If you don't see this you are either 1) making enough money you are part of the problem 2) don't actually live in the US so have a completely unmoored understanding of reality on the ground here

I obviously don’t live in the US. My entire point was that people say that care about school shootings and etc., but unless they do anything about it, those are just words.

Given the voting record of the majority of the population, I tend to believe that an average American cares more about SPX. Which, honestly, is fine by me. Every nation and culture is different, freedom and etc. etc.. But it would be hard to convince me that an average citizen cares about it, because, once again, nothing has changed in decades.

For the record, I have nothing against Americans, you guys are a lovely bunch. But it is what it is.

We literally can't do anything dude, what are you advocating for? That we have an armed rebellion to legislate the people's laws under a workers tribunal?

I'm really curious what country you live in because it's one that's clearly not a democracy. Not saying it as an insult either, but surely even in countries run by authoritarians there is an understanding that leadership is sometimes completely divorced from the people?

I also personally have a hard time blaming voters for anything, in America we have two corporate powers that have been neglecting the material needs of workers for nearly 40 years now; when you have two corporate parties power tends to be unstable for any meaningful legislation which tends to only benefit the elites + corporations whereas workers require constant legislation to help them and guide the country to benefit them.

When you see very little material outcomes you will vote for more extreme candidates. I honestly believe this is the real lesson how fascism can flourish, and I think this is something that can easily be predicted with extreme accuracy too. You look at the Weimar Republic, it was one of the most advanced and democratic governments on Earth; yet it failed to stop the threat of Nazis, mostly due to the ineptitude of politicians that also rejected the material needs of a nation.

I know this is a huge tangent but I think it's useful to write, because I'm really curios on your upbringing. I'd think understanding power, corruption, and out of touch governments to be universal human experiences but maybe not. D:

Indeed, the more accurate way to say it is that people in the US don't care enough about mass school shootings to do something about it besides thought and prayers.

If you're not American, one thing that you have to keep in mind whenever you hear "there's large public support in the US for [insert vaguely left-wing thing here] but nothing gets done about it" is that the US's system of government is really only vaguely a democracy. It gives a disproportionate amount of power to conservative rural voters at the expense of everybody else.

This is exemplified in the Senate, which is the least representative legislative body of any democracy I am aware of. Each state gets 2 votes regardless of population, so Wyoming (population ~550,000) is given the same amount of votes as California (population ~39,000,000). Any remotely controversial piece of legislation needs to pass the Senate with a 60% majority. This means that 21 Republican states making up ~20% of the population can block any bill they don't want to pass. Senators are also elected for 6 year terms, which limits how accountable they are to their constituents.

If a bill gets past the Senate, it makes its way to the president, who has veto power over all legislation. The president is elected by electors selected by the states rather than individual voters, and the number of electors is not fairly apportioned either. For example, there are ~728,000 people per elector in California, but ~196,000 people per elector in Wyoming.

In effect, this means that public opinion has essentially no impact on the legislation the US government passes. A 2014 Princeton study ( https://archive.org/details/gilens_and_page_2014_-testing_th... ) found that "When the preferences of economic elites and the stands of organized interest groups are controlled for, the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy."

If you're interested in why the system was designed this way, I highly recommend the book "The Framers' Coup" by Michael Klarman.

Maybe we can incorporate the children one by one in delaware and then people will care.

On the plus side they will also then qualify for billions in government subsidies.

Won't matter if they're not publicly traded.

We could sell options on their future incomes, or taxes. An idea worth exploring. How can we encourage investment in future generations?

Isn't that what we call public debt?

I recommend revisiting this comment when you have a son or daughter.

Why has HN become utterly useless as a place where meaningful discussions can be held?

A response concerning the model being prompted for information that could be used to aid cyberattaks ie - "Are there going to be bans on things that could be used to aid in school shootings next?" floats right to the top of the comment listings and the responses are quite irrelevant.

What is it with this place?

In the past I came to see what the comments about the articles were is hoping they would share more light on the topic. Right now they are totally meaningless.

I mean, for most of the world that is not the gotcha you think it is…

It's not supposed to be a gotcha, it's supposed to be an example of the hypocrisy of the government.

Similar example Ohio legislature makes it illegal to drive with any THC of Cannabis products in the passenger compartment to crack down on people driving high, but there is nothing to prevent you driving with an open bottle of prescription opiates or benzos and popping those while you drive.

Bad choice of example, then. Restricting things that are uniquely and critical to planning and executing school shootings is a highly desirable outcome for regulation, in the eyes of a society that desires its youth to grow up without constant threat of murder at their mandatory educational institutions. That desire is not particularly uniform in the U.S. right now, in contrast with much of the world. Choosing murder sprees as an example supports regulations that have societal safety benefits, which is the opposite of what was intended. Perhaps a different example might have the desired effect?

> Restricting things that are uniquely and critical to planning and executing

Which it isn't.

I thought that was the point, that it's an excuse to "protect" in a way that doesn't actually protect.

In which case it's a good example.

Most of the world didn't ban Fable.

One infringes on a specific constitutional right.

Also, this country would get even more dangerous without good citizens owning guns.

IMO it's like herd immunity. Not everyone has guns. But the criminals don't know who does and who doesn't, so in a way they treat all homes as potentially being armed.

Our criminals are already pretty care free, I can't imagine how much worse it would be if they KNEW no one was armed.

The brainwashing is truly staggering isn't it?

A waste of an aged account.

While there is some truth here, it's worth noting that firearms are far from a deterrent - these days, many criminals are often enraged by a victim having a gun and end up escalating further. Earlier this year there was a gang execution in Minneapolis that was prominent national news. The thugs were probably just going to kick the shit out of the victim, but when they discovered he merely had a gun, they took it from him and then held him down and shot him repeatedly in the back. Or there was another famous killing in Louisville about 6 years back. It started off as a simple night time home invasion but when one of the residents started to defend themselves by firing a warning shot, the perps responded by turning the home into a shooting gallery and ended up killing the other resident. So these days it's more of a toss up because we're not in the Wild West or even Paul Kersey's cities, but rather subject to highly organized crime that demands supplicating obedience and will readily retaliate against anyone who tries to defend themselves.

If the homeowners had a shotgun it would have been over quickly. Shotguns don't miss.

There were like seven assailants, and the shot actually did hit one of them in the leg. This is what caused the others to retaliate. I don't think a shotgun would have helped. Unfortunately the incident was not a game of DOOM.

If anything that is an argument for extended magazines.

At a certain point numbers just don't work out that way. Being woken up in the middle of the night and facing seven alert and well-prepared attackers? Good luck.

The real problem is the corrupt politically-motivated DA who declined to even charge most of the perps. Only one of them got any jail time. The others are still out on our streets. Individual action can help mitigate, but it can't make up for the trend of politicians accepting and normalizing violent crime.

full auto, defensive grenades

Plasma rifle might be able to pull it off.

Clearly every household needs a BFG9000.

Bullshit. Shotguns are not designed to have a wide pattern close up. They're designed to have a wide pattern out at 40 yards or so.

Sawed off shotguns have a wider pattern closer, but it's wildly random and impossible to aim with any real effectiveness.

I have both. I shoot trap. My gun on my bedside is a p226 with a flashlight that has a strobe option.

The warning shot was the main mistake. It goes against all training. Only shoot to kill.

Accounts differ. It's hard to tell if it was really a warning shot or if that's merely what the resident said after the fact to avoid being prosecuted for having defended themselves.

Doh, the ones who own the guns are the criminal. If not today, one day in the future.

Most women who own a firearm and get shot are shot with their own firearm.

Firearms in an household with kids need to be locked out for the safety of all, rendering them useless if someone in a family is in threat of being harmed. There is virtually zero situation where it would help the family. Trying to stop a robbery is the best way to get shot, armed or not. One is always better off letting the thieves go and get compensation from insurance. Weapons im your household only increase the chance of someone in the household killing their spouse/siblings/parents without increasing the safety against criminals outside.

Gun owners who pretend to arm themselves against crime are really converting themselves into potential criminals. One can be mentally ok at the date of purchase but nobody can be 100% sure their mental health will stay the same all their life and we can't expect them to surrender their firearms when needed. Thus it should be a crime in itself to purchase guns.

> One infringes on a specific constitutional right.

The ability to develop and use technological products is, y'know, kinda protected speech under the first amendment.

Congress shall make no law... unless you're talking about stuff we think is dangerous; in that case foreigners can't say it and you can't tell them.

I'm not American so maybe I'm missing something, but doesn't the Constitution apply to all citizens? Is it not then unconstitutional to prevent federal inmates from possessing firearms while incarcerated?

Yes you lose many of your rights when in prison.

Not all citizens have the right to freedom: "except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted"

https://www.senate.gov/about/origins-foundations/senate-and-...

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