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From: jonathan@geop.ubc.ca (Jonathan Thornburg)
Newsgroups: comp.society
Subject: Re: Computers as weapons
Message-ID: <1776@limbo.Intuitive.Com>
Date: 18 Feb 91 22:13:47 GMT
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[ed: respondents, please try to keep on the track of computers/technology
 and society.  The discussion of pacifism vs other solutions to world
 problems is exceptionally interesting, but not appropriate for this
 discussion forum.  Thanks greatly!			 -- Dave Taylor]

In a recent comp.society posting, Tim Klein asked about the ethics of 
working on military computing projects.  He said he choose not to consider 
career opportunities in military organizations to avoid this sort of work.

In particular, he said:

> ... one good way for a computer programmer to resist warfare is simply 
> to avoid working for the military... I ask this in all sincerity -- this 
> is not meant as a flame, and I hope responces to this question will be 
> kept on a mature level.

This is a very prescient and telling point.  I agree 100% (with both
of the portions of the posting I quoted).

I'd like to extend this point, to cover all computer science (hereinafter 
"CS") research & development ("R&D").  Here I mean almost all academic CS 
research, AT&T Bell Labs CS stuff, the large industrial concerns like 
Xerox PARC, IBM Research, DEC Western Research Labs, etc.

I think that if you agree with the quoted statement above, you probably
shouldn't persue a career in CS R&D at all, even in a "non-military"
facility.

What I'm asserting here is that, given the state of the world today
(I'm talking about things smoothed over decade-long time spans; this
year's mideast war isn't relevant here), *most* new R&D in CS stands
a good chance of being used to kill people within not very many years.
If you don't want to be a party to that, it seems to me that you are
forced to not do CS R&D.

This topic has a strong personal angle with me -- about 10 years ago I
decided to leave CS for this reason, and move to physics.

As an undergraduate I took concurrent programs in Math, Physics, and
CS because I was fascinated by all three.  I knew I wanted to go on
to grad school and a career in academia, but was undecided between
the three subject areas.  Math had been my first love as a child, but
Physics and most recently CS had also been fascinating throughout my
undergraduate career.  I had worked as a research assistant on a CS
prof's research project for several summers.

After finding out that (at the time, this was in the early 1980s) DARPA
contributed around 80% (I'm fuzzy on the exact figure, but this is(was)
the right ballpark) of the academic CS funding in the US, and thinking
a lot about the ultimate uses which would be made of new developments I
would be researching, I decided I didn't want "my ideas are now being
used to kill people" on my conscience, and hence I didn't want to go to
grad school (& hence a career) in CS.

After a series of coincidences which aren't relevant here, I ended up
in theoretical physics.  I'm now just finishing a Ph.D thesis in
numerical general relativity, working towards a numerical simulation
of what happens when two black holes collide.

I'm well aware of the long and sad history of physics (and indeed all)
R&D being used for nefarious ends, notably mass murder, but I think
that with physics (as with most other non-CS fields) one can, with care,
choose subfields that will probably not find military application for
a long time to come.  In contrast, in CS, except for *very* theoretical
work that borders into pure mathematics, this seems a lot harder.

In my current field there's enough computing (numerical solution of
coupled nonlinear elliptic-hyperbolic PDEs) to satisfy my fascination
with CS.  There remain quasi-CS areas nearby which I'm very concious
of military interest and involvement in, and which I thus try to avoid,
but the scope for research is so vast that's not a great restriction.
I can't say what I'd do if this (vast scope for research which I feel
is non-military and will stay that way for a long time) weren't the
case.

And yes, to answer the question I'm sure 256 people will ask, I'm
well aware of the ethical dilemmas posed by absolute pacifism vs armed
neutrality vs Pax Romanica vs the Holocaust vs ... .  I'm uncertain
about my position in such a matter "when the chips are down".  A very
relevant historical account of (successful) absolute pacifism in
occupied France in 1942-5 given in

	Lest Innocent Blood Be Shed
	Philip P. Hallie
	Harper & Row (New York), 1979
	DS 135 F85 C453 1979

Jonathan Thornburg