2018 American Political Scene

[Officer of Engineers]

How am I changing the goal post? I am not a farmer, I am reading the grumblings from farmers.

You are being chicken little. Yes, Trump made things tough but it isn't anything the farmers have not weathered before.

It is not always about safety, it is more about cheap labor, But that illustrates my point. Technology costs come down, even below manual labor. Therefore, unless forced by regulation (which is a real possibility), companies will move to machines. Even in India, over the years I have seen a lot of the manual jobs at road or building construction sites taken over by machines while safety systems (helmets and high Viz jackets) have come on. One of the big complaints of the MNREGA employment guarantee scheme now is that it focusses on building assets instead of employing people (translation : machines are being used instead of people). The result is that the pace of road construction have picked up, even as less manual laborers (comparatively) are getting employed.

You point to India as the example. I cannot find any.

But Col, where will they get this training if you stop funding the training programs? In Seattle, there are plenty of opportunities, not so much in rural Appalachia. No one is giving or asking for handouts. The focus is on training/ re-skilling programs. After that it is on them to get jobs. And they are getting that. That is why Eastern Kentucky is not "Silicon Hollow"

The training was always there. You're asking tax payer dollars to pay for it instead out of the person's own pockets.

You know, that sounds like a generation ago, because it is. Nowadays, DR systems are quite robust.

At the end of the day, you need to keep that conveyor belt going. I don't care how many servers or data entry points or data recovery systems you have. That conveyor belt stops, your production stops. In the case of Amazon, if the planes don't fly (as on 11 Sept), they don't deliver.

So we need fewer spooks then.

Far from it. We still need spooks to tell the drones where to look. And we need more people (pilots, sigs management, backup power grid, mechanics, fuel management, MPs to guard the ops room) to operate those drones than a 2 man sniper team lying in wait for their targets.

My googlefu is weak?? It is a Mil website!!!

Yep. You just googled bayonet and then pick out the web site. Yet, we still issue the bayonet and you did not asked why.

[snapper]

Hence, low confidence of actually putting driverless cars on the roads anytime soon.

Your low confidence? If we are required to be insured - as seems likely - litigation will continue on the same basis as it does today. If a vehicle is faulty then the producer will be sued - as they are today. Considering the number of lives lost annually in road incidents and safer automated system will be a large step forward.

[Officer of Engineers]

Your low confidence?

How about government? No one in any government is prepared to certified driverless cars on any level anytime soon. Even in current testing, the requirement is that the driver must remain in control of the car at all times.

You know? It really helps if you educate yourself about these things before spouting out garbage.

[snapper]

In 2016 37,461 people in the US died in road accidents. But they will not allow driverless cars because three people died in testing? Get real... We already have driverless trains that work no problem.

[Officer of Engineers]

In 2016 37,461 people in the US died in road accidents. But they will not allow driverless cars because three people died in testing? Get real... We already have driverless trains that work no problem.

Don't worry about it. It's not your government and not your problem. They're not going to certified driverless cars and you have no say in the matter.

And what part of testing don't you get? The freaking cars FAILED the test! Jeeze, stupidity abound.

[Ironduke]

snapper,

Driverless car technology is still too immature and bleeding edge at the moment. With all the things the folks who are pushing driverless cars want to do (and they want it now, now, now!), if they could do it all by 2019, some hacker could take control over a million cars and turn them into a WMD.

There are algorithms in a driverless car OS that recognizes people via the sensors, which then instructs the driverless car to brake and avoid pedestrians. A hacker could simply re-write the code to do the reverse - run them over instead of braking and avoiding. And they could potentially do this to thousands or even millions of driverless cars, and carry out a mass terrorist attack.

We'll get there, eventually. 37,461 dead may be tragic, but it's a necessary sacrifice for the time being. It sure beats other worst-case scenario alternatives, that are in fact a very real, dangerous possibility.

As far as this and other technologies are concerned, there is no problem in taking our time and getting it right the first time. Measure twice, cut once, as they say in the construction trade.

[Officer of Engineers]

Let's put that 37,461 deaths in perspective. There are approximately less than 80 driverless cars in the US at the moment. 3 deaths is 4% fatality. There are 263.6 million registered cars in the US. That's .014% fatality. So driverless cars are 286 times more deadly than cars with drivers. I, too, can play with numbers.

[citanon]

Let's put that 37,461 deaths in perspective. There are approximately less than 80 driverless cars in the US at the moment. 3 deaths is 4% fatality. There are 263.6 million registered cars in the US. That's .014% fatality. So driverless cars are 286 times more deadly than cars with drivers. I, too, can play with numbers.

Yeah. Driverless cars have tons of problems.

A key reason is that today's neural networks do.pattern recognition well but can't reason like human beings. They are all instinct with some hard coded logic.

For example, they can't say to themselves, I'm heading west at sunset and the sun is blinding my sensors, just follow the car in front of me slowly. They are more like perfectly obedient and consistent mice trained to read signs and follow the rules of the road.

To compensate for poor reasoning, they rely on better sensing. That's why they need stuff like lidar.

However, humans can benefit from the sensing and automated instincts too in the form of automated safety systems.

I suspect that humans drivers with the assistance of automated safety systems and sensors will beat fully automated cars on safety for a long time to come.

[citanon]

Going back to Eric Greiten, the Governor of Missouri, you'd think that the background checks and psych evaluations for the SEAL selection process should have weeded him out due to character and judgment issues.

SEALs select for people who can execute the missions, not sure if Greiten's private problems would register.

Btw, I read one of the committee reports. That guy sounds like a scum bag in private.

[citanon]

If Aliens show up we are doomed. Intelligence requires comptetition. Prey animals don't master the stars. On top of that, what ever colonists are in deep sleep probably have merciless robots awake to do all the prep work. No talking, no bargaining, just some asteroids from impact then let the dust settle.

What if they are like our millennials?

[Officer of Engineers]

Yeah. Driverless cars have tons of problems.

Until you get all driverless cars on the road and ban human drivers altogether, you're going to have major problems trying to mix the two systems. I really doubt driverless trucks can share the road with agressive car drivers, especially those who thinks the laws of the road are only guidelines.

[Red Team]

What if they are like our millennials?

We can bribe our way out of extinction, with the promise of paying off their rent and student loans.

[Officer of Engineers]

Only if I still had my scotch collection.

[antimony]

You are being chicken little. Yes, Trump made things tough but it isn't anything the farmers have not weathered before.

Yeah, given that tariff wars set off the whole Great Depression, I remain unconvinced that this would not cascade to something greater.

You point to India as the example. I cannot find any.

Less automation, more manual labor. Once the cost of automation goes down, the manual labor will go away. A huge part of the communist movement in the '90s was to prevent any computerization in anything whatsoever, because of expected job losses.

The training was always there. You're asking tax payer dollars to pay for it instead out of the person's own pockets.

Leaders are supposed to be visionaries. A big wave is coming and I would expect the Great Leader to see that and take steps to make the country ready for that. All industry experts are talking about it. Trump is talking instead about coal. If your vision is that everyone becomes a plumber or an electrician to survive, well, not going to happen.

At the end of the day, you need to keep that conveyor belt going. I don't care how many servers or data entry points or data recovery systems you have. That conveyor belt stops, your production stops. In the case of Amazon, if the planes don't fly (as on 11 Sept), they don't deliver.

At the end of the day, technological progress will happen, whether you like it or not. It does not matter how things were done or are done in the military, industry is in a disrption mode. Anyone who does not wise up gets left behind. Remember Blockbuster? At the same time that Amazon is rising, traditional box stores are closing. Bank branches employ a bare minimum of people and actively try to reduce footfall. How we work and get entertained, how we eat, how we live and travel has radically changed even if you do not acknwoedge it.

Far from it. We still need spooks to tell the drones where to look. And we need more people (pilots, sigs management, backup power grid, mechanics, fuel management, MPs to guard the ops room) to operate those drones than a 2 man sniper team lying in wait for their targets.

But that is not a fair comparison. They are covering far more ground and engaging more targets than just a 2 person sniper team can. You have changed the scope on me.

Yep. You just googled bayonet and then pick out the web site. Yet, we still issue the bayonet and you did not asked why.

Are you yourself still convinced that bayonets are essential tools in the modern battlefield?

[Red Team]

A key reason is that today's neural networks do.pattern recognition well but can't reason like human beings. They are all instinct with some hard coded logic.

At that stage of advancement, AI with the ability to do human reasoning wouldn't be too far off self-awareness. THAT is a whole other can of worms.

EDIT: I just realized, what if we implemented exclusive driverless car lanes on the highways? Having a lane of traffic entirely separate from human controlled cars could mitigate the issue of human variability to a degree.