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People in technology fields absolutely have an obligation to talk about the morality of technology.

I'd highly recommend you to read Cat's Cradle if you haven't already. Carl Sagan also had something to say about this.

In lieu of that, one can meditate on this more condensed take:

> Don't say that he's hypocritical

> Say rather that he's apolitical

> "Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?

> That's not my department!" says Wernher von Braun

- Tom Lehrer



I don't think people in technology should stop talking about these things, I just think they should talk about it somewhere other than HN.


Technology doesn't exist in a vacuum. It exists to address societal, political, existential (climate change), or financial problems. For example, let's talk about self driving cars (my field). The only reason they are necessary are fundamentally societal (people die from cars) and political (America doesn't want to invest in public transit for many societal reasons that aren't logical). It's a technology that doesn't have to exist. These societal issues are the reason why it's worth investing in the tech and they affect the design of the car and what problems it needs to solve.

I get the appeal of trying to look at technology solely in isolation, but society influences whether technology needs to exist and how it's designed.


Maybe you should just not read the comments? Literally hundred+ other articles every day to read and comment on.




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