'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spree in Gaza

Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by imjonse on Wednesday April 03, 2024 @02:30PM (#39921143)

The same author wrote Nazi Nexus, with separate chapters for different US companies' (Ford, GM) dealings with the Nazi regime. It can always be a case of "let's not bring politics into work" attitude or the belief that "tech is a tool only, can be used for good or ill" but at least in the years leading up to WW2 there was a lot of support for eugenics, antisemitism (Henry Ford was a notorious one) and other Nazi tendencies in the US too. I would not be surprised if many of those working on killer AI today were politically motivated and not just developers caught in projects they don't really have their hearts in.

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by Sleepful on Wednesday April 03, 2024 @04:49PM (#39922922)

Operation Paperclip et al

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by GaryNumanVevo on Thursday April 04, 2024 @04:24AM (#39927813)

Don't forget Japanese Unit 731, all the scientists involved were whisked away to the US if they would give up their research on human subjects to the US military and help translate.

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by boppo1 on Thursday April 04, 2024 @06:54AM (#39928711)

Is any of that declassified now? Did we actually learn anything other than 'causing pain causes pain'?

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by ender341341 on Thursday April 04, 2024 @04:48PM (#39935629)

there's a lot of "these are some tested to failure limits for humans" results that are of use in medical settings, but they aren't really needed and end up being more of a "fatal dose" style measure.

The most used one I've heard about is studying hypothermia because they took quite detailed notes on the different stages and how the body reacted.

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by HanClinto on Saturday April 06, 2024 @09:33AM (#39952342)

Years ago I read a blog post by a Jewish doctor who was trying to do hypothermia research without relying on Nazi data. His ultimate conclusion was that it was not reasonable to discard this data, because treatment would be very inadequate without it. It would unnecessarily hurt people today to give lesser care, and it would not be a positive testament to the memory of those victims to throw it all away.

I haven't been able to find that blog post again, but I often think about it and would love to bookmark it.

It's in a similar vein of ethical question to embryonic stem cell treatments, but certainly with very different aspects between them.

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by ender341341 on Saturday April 06, 2024 @02:43PM (#39954459)

That's definitely my belief with it too, and it wasn't a blog but I remember a history teacher in high school pointed me at a couple similar papers when I expressed discomfort that we'd use such horrific research.

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by selimthegrim on Wednesday April 03, 2024 @06:59PM (#39924414)

The weird thing is, I’ve seen this author post factually incorrect things about early Islamic history. I just wish he was more careful about things outside his area of expertise.

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by zelphirkalt on Thursday April 04, 2024 @04:46AM (#39927972)

Only recently someone here on HN posted a video about some big hall in the US, where nazi supporters gathered in droves. It made it seem like they had significant ideological footing in the US as well. Unthinkable what could have happened, if they had had even more support. Not exactly this video that was linked, but this seems to be about the same gathering: https://invidious.baczek.me/watch?v=r4zRZ7XLYSA

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Re:'Lavender': The AI machine directing Israel's bombing spr... by cmurf on Thursday April 04, 2024 @10:25AM (#39930815)

It was 1939 at Madison Square Garden, NYC

https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2019/02/20/695941323...

You’ll find these bad ideas never really die. Look and you’ll see it throughout time and location. Russia, Germany, the U.S., Japan. Tyranny isn’t something accidental, exotic or mysterious. People take their eye off the ball and get clobbered with it from time to time.

I’ll always argue we’re better off with a world war than tyranny, but the whole goddamn point of the UN Charter is to prevent both. The lesson was learned. It was written down. And we’re still fucking it up again.

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