The real problems in San Francisco and elsewhere, the problems that are hurting and displacing people, aren't caused by self-driving cars or software to make construction more efficient, and the people experiencing pain will not be made better by casting out all of the professionals, many of whom politically side with progressive causes. (And isn't doing home composting and growing your own garden what Berkeley protesters would demand people do?) The local governments need to figure out ways to encourage affordable housing.
Yes, DARPA funds long range research which can be used for military purposes. That includes the Internet, which was DARPA funded. But all technological research has dual use. The Internet could have been used as a command-and-control network for the military during war, but it is also used to distribute political dissent.
The same research into chemicals and biology that allow life saving medicines to be created to save children around the world can also be used to make chemical and biological weapons. Fertilizer grows food, it also makes bombs.
Google X's Car project doesn't seem to have anything to do with making weapons for the DoD. This is pure guilt-by-tenuous-association. Many college campuses also enter these DARPA challenges, where's the protests?
The purpose of the car is to solve a very real social problem: hundreds of thousands of people are killed in auto accidents around the world every year and millions more are seriously injured needing to go to the emergency room. This is an enormous social cost which could be used to fund better housing, or education, but instead is going to treat injuries and repair and replace damaged vehicles. There is no evidence of a Google contract with DoD for Google Car technology for weapons.
What I find really disturbing is the level dehumanization. The protest is peaceful now, but the first step to encouraging violence against someone is to describe them in dehumanizing terms (a robot). When gun-advocates like Sarah Palin start using rhetorical devices that dehumanizes opponents and paints literal gun targets on them, we are not surprised turning up the rhetorical temperature leads to violent confrontation, the behavior shouldn't be tolerated or defended on the other side.
> to describe them in dehumanizing terms (a robot).
Anthony Levandrowski has self-described himself as a robot:
"Although Levandowski spent most of his childhood in Brussels, his English has no accent aside from a certain absence of inflection—the bright, electric chatter of a processor in overdrive. “My fiancée is a dancer in her soul,” he told me. “I’m a robot.” "[1]
I think that's purposefully way too literal an interpretation. It's clear to me that that's not to be taken as a literal statement but rather figurative contrasting himself with his fiancee who is more lithe, in spirit, if not physically.
Yes, DARPA funds long range research which can be used for military purposes. That includes the Internet, which was DARPA funded. But all technological research has dual use. The Internet could have been used as a command-and-control network for the military during war, but it is also used to distribute political dissent.
The same research into chemicals and biology that allow life saving medicines to be created to save children around the world can also be used to make chemical and biological weapons. Fertilizer grows food, it also makes bombs.
Google X's Car project doesn't seem to have anything to do with making weapons for the DoD. This is pure guilt-by-tenuous-association. Many college campuses also enter these DARPA challenges, where's the protests?
The purpose of the car is to solve a very real social problem: hundreds of thousands of people are killed in auto accidents around the world every year and millions more are seriously injured needing to go to the emergency room. This is an enormous social cost which could be used to fund better housing, or education, but instead is going to treat injuries and repair and replace damaged vehicles. There is no evidence of a Google contract with DoD for Google Car technology for weapons.
What I find really disturbing is the level dehumanization. The protest is peaceful now, but the first step to encouraging violence against someone is to describe them in dehumanizing terms (a robot). When gun-advocates like Sarah Palin start using rhetorical devices that dehumanizes opponents and paints literal gun targets on them, we are not surprised turning up the rhetorical temperature leads to violent confrontation, the behavior shouldn't be tolerated or defended on the other side.