TODAY.”Lavender” Where’s Daddy” -Sweet euphemisms for a dehumanized, grotesquely technologized future in “the Cloud”
It’s not really new. It has always been part of the playful little-boy mentality of the clever men who design weapons. Think of “Little Boy” – the atomic bomb that devastated Hiroshima, and the less fun-named “Fat Man” plutonium bomb dropped on Nagasaki.
Perhaps, for the servicemen actually dropping those bombs, the fun names might have helped to ease them in any anxiety about killing many thousands of civilians – children, women and men.
Well, no need for servicemen to worry like that nowadays. With Artificial Intelligence making the kill decisions, no human need feel any guilt.
So – why do they bother with the cute sweet names?
Well, apart from the little-boy mentality of the weapons designers, there is the very much more important reason – to deceive the public, to obfuscate, cover-up, veil, the horror of the new AI weaponry. And where better to hide things these days, than in the cloud?
I’ve written before about the cloud. It’s such a light, pretty, concept. Just wafting away into the never-never – nothing to worry about, nothing for mere mortals to try to understand. Leave it to the grown-up little boys to work out what to do with the cloud, and the new cute war toys too.
The cloud is, of course, an ever-increasing set of dirty great data “farms” (another cutesy word) around the world – large areas on land, not in the sky, with huge steel containers, with servers and computers guzzling electricity and water.
There is nothing vague about these things, except for the language used.
“Lavender” – an accurate name would be “Finder for Kill Victims “
“Where’s Daddy” – an accurate name would be “Tracker for Killing Location”
George Orwell would be delighted with this 21st Century obfuscating language. He warned us about vague and meaningless language intended to hide the truth rather than express it.
And – it’s not as if these automatic killing systems are just being perfected so that the evil Hamas can be defeated. There’s another purpose for using them in Gaza . They’re a practise run for trying out this merchandise – a lucrative industry for Israel for the future: –
“intelligent” weapons proven effective in Gaza were major attractions when Israel marketed them last month at the Singapore Airshow, East Asia’s biggest arms bazaar”.
Nuclear lobby manipulates ABC’s 7.30 Report
By Noel Wauchope | 11 April 2024, https://independentaustralia.net/business/business-display/nuclear-lobby-manipulates-abcs-730,18498—
An ABC report on nuclear energy presented a one-sided viewpoint, dominated by the pro-nuclear lobby, writes Noel Wauchope.
ON 4 APRIL, on ABC’s 7.30, regional affairs reporter Jane Norman presented a sort of debate on nuclear power for Australia. An accompanying article was also published on 2 April as a debate about ‘a generational divide’.
The show was quite gripping, with excellent visual snippets of Australia’s history of nuclear issues and promotional visualisation of the industry’s proposed new small modular reactors (SMRs).
The essence of this debate seemed to be that old people are inclined to oppose nuclear power, but young people see it as a new and valuable way to reduce carbon emissions and counter global heating.
In discussing the pros and cons of nuclear power, Norman, herself relatively young, mentioned some recent opinion polls in which public opinion was split, with younger Australians being more supportive of nuclear.
In opposition to nuclear, elderly Indigenous Aunty Sue Haseldine gave an intensely personal history, passionately setting out her concern for the environment and for the children of the future. We learned, as the programme went on, that older generations had been influenced by the history of past atomic tests in Australia, and by past accidents overseas, and had developed a distrust of nuclear power.
And, presently, the Liberal Coalition Opposition, led by Peter Dutton, is putting nuclear ‘at the centre of its energy policy’.
Moving on to those supporting nuclear power, Jane Norman interviewed the enthusiastic Helen Cook.
Cook is deeply involved in the pro-nuclear lobby as principal of GNE Advisory, whose website states:
‘Helen is recognised as a nuclear law expert by the International Atomic Energy Agency [and] the former Chair of the World Nuclear Association’s Law Working Group…’
She is definitely a nuclear promoter and a favoured speaker for the industry, along with luminaries such as Michael Shellenberger, Zion Lights and Dr Adi Paterson. She said that she had had trouble overseas trying to explain Australia’s ban against nuclear power, but now back in Australia, did not find negative attitudes towards it.
We then heard very limited support from the Grattan Institute‘s Tony Wood. He was clear that at present the economics for nuclear power are “terrible”, but said that SMRs could be an option for the future. (BHP, a big uranium miner, is a big backer of the Grattan Institute.)
The programme reinforced the message for small nuclear power, showing attractive graphics of SMRs prominently marked with text: ‘Reliable, cost-effective, clean and safe.’
Then came Mark Ho, nuclear engineer and president of the Australian Nuclear Association, on the need to overturn the legislation banning nuclear. Construction of SMRs would take from three to five years.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) says that a country could go from considering nuclear energy to having nuclear energy in its power grid in ten to 15 years
Associate Professor Edward Obbard, the head of nuclear engineering at UNSW, was the final pro-nuclear expert. He explained that there is, among young people, very little opposition to AUKUS nuclear submarines. Younger generations regard climate change as the greatest threat, so nuclear could be one of the solutions. Obbard sees it as a moral case — an environmentally low-impact way to decarbonise.
Helen Cook has interesting insights. She says that Australia has expertise in nuclear power — a questionable claim when it is based on just the staff of one small research reactor. She argues that the USA, Japan and Ukraine have experienced severe nuclear accidents, yet have pledged to treble their nuclear energy production by 2050. One does wonder why.
This is problematic, as all three countries are burdened with nuclear waste and the industry now promises the reactors that might “eat the waste” (itself a dodgy claim). The UK government now admits that the nuclear weapons industry is the real reason for civil nuclear reactors. Her case for nuclear power for Australia seems to boil down to if others are doing this, so should we.
So we have on one side a little old (very articulate and eloquent) Indigenous lady, who probably does not have a university degree, let alone a big job in the industry, versus four “highly qualified” prestigious members of the pro-nuclear lobby.
I wrote to 7.30 suggesting a bit of genuine balance in this debate. I suggested for speakers the very well-informed Jim Green, of the international Nuclear Consulting Group and Friends of the Earth Australia, Dr Helen Caldicott, or Dave Sweeney of the Australian Conservation Foundation. But I now reflect that these might be a bit much for the ABC.
They might consider interviewing former nuclear supporters such as Ziggy Switkowski, Alan Finkel, or some more neutral experts like economist Professor John Quiggin or Jeremy Cooper.
Anyway, it’s the same old problem of false balance that has plagued the ABC in the past.
And there’s another dimension, now. The programme depicted Aunty Sue Haseldine as an admirable person, with genuine concern and emotion. But she hasn’t got the facts, the new young expert technical facts that appeal to today’s young people.
But 7.30 didn’t really present the facts. The gee-whiz SMRs are not new and young. They were tried out in the 1940s to 1960s but turned out to be uneconomic, time-consuming, gave poor performance and produced toxic wastes. The programme glossed over important issues such as waste problems, genuine study of the probable delays before SMRs could be operational, safety issues, risks of terrorism and weapons proliferation.
The ABC has a pretty noble history of tackling tough issues. And so does Sarah Ferguson, presenter of 7.30. I think they let us down this time and hope they will rectify this.
Coalition nuclear plan would force consumers to wait 20 years longer for 30% higher electricity bills
ReNewEconomy, Ben Rose, Apr 11, 2024
The Coalition is making unproven assertions that 100% ‘zero emissions’ electricity can be provided more cheaply and reliably by nuclear than renewable energy. It has even proposed sites for nuclear reactors, including Collie in Western Australia, which currently has three coal fired power stations.
This article compares weighted average levelized cost of energy (WALCOE) for nuclear grid scenarios, with those of renewable energy (RE) grid scenarios for Western Australia’s South West Integrated System (SWIS). The modelled scenarios deliver 95% and 100% near zero emissions energy (Table 1)
Much has been written about the impediments to nuclear in Australia, including laws prohibiting it, storage of nuclear waste, costly insurance/ underwriting of plants, 10-15 year lead time, the unavailability of commercial small modular reactors and likely cost overruns, all of which would add to the cost.
LCOE modelling does not include any of these ‘externalized items’ and therefore considerably underestimates the real cost of nuclear.
In this analysis I have used the renewable energy modelling software SIREN and my LCOE modelling software PowerBalance2, which uses the formula: WALCOE of grid scenario = (sum annualized amortized capital costs plus fixed costs plus variable costs including fuels, of all power stations) / grid annual energy demand.
Capital costs, technology, life time and interest rates are from CSIRO, 2024 Gen Cost draft report, 2024. (Appendices B2, B5, B6).
From Table 1 [on original] it is clear that scenario 1, ‘RE generation with 8 hour batteries plus 24 hr pumped hydro storage (PHS)’ would deliver the lowest cost 95% near zero emissions (NZE) scenario at $119/MWh.
Converting the OCGT generation to green hydrogen (H2) at an assumed cost of 5 times natural gas gives a 100% scenario costing $133/ MWh, which is still 28% cheaper than replacing Collie coal with nuclear and provides the rest of the energy requirements with RE.
All scenarios assume 1.66 times 2017 demand, which should be enough to cover 2030 demand including vehicle electrification………………………………………………
The lowest cost nuclear option is replacing the existing 1550 MW of coal generators at Collie/ Muja with 1800 MW of nuclear, assumed to be small 300 MW units, allowing one to cover down time.
If this were commenced in 2027, the earliest possible for a Coalition government to initiate it, renewable energy installation would slow from that date and the nuclear plant would not be completed until after 2040. Table 1 shows the cost of this scenario is $171/ MWh, 28% higher than ‘RE with batteries and pumped hydro (PHS)’.
Due to its inability to switch on and off and ramp below 50%, nuclear has to continue to generate even when much lower cost RE is available and has to be spilled (See Figure 2). This is the major issue that makes nuclear unsuitable for integration with RE.
‘Nuclear with Existing RE’, (scenario 5 in Table 1) is the other ‘less implausible’ scenario. RE build is curtailed in 2027 and 3900 MW of nuclear would be completed after 2040. This would provide electricity at $203/ MWh, which is 59% higher the RE scenario 1.
Scenarios 6 and 7 – ‘Nuclear and natural gas’ and ‘Nuclear only’ – are included for cost comparison only. They could never be implemented as the electricity cost is exorbitant – 80% and 115% respectively higher than the RE equivalent scenarios.
Also, existing and planned RE – about 1300 MW of wind and 2000 MW of mainly rooftop PV – would have to be decommissioned.
The unthinkable situation of doing nothing until 2040 then waiting until 2055 for a nuclear near zero emissions grid was also modelled (Table 1 column 5).
The CSIRO GenCost forecasts that all capex costs will fall and that nuclear cost will decline most (from $21.2 million to $11.2 m / MWh). LCOEs of scenarios 4 -7 with increasing amounts of nuclear were still 10% – 49% higher than the corresponding RE scenarios.
This analysis has been overly generous to nuclear. The costs of radioactive waste disposal and Government underwriting have not been included.
There are unrealistic assumptions that small nuclear reactors could actually be constructed at the reducing costs predicted by GenCost without over-runs and that there would be no new transmission and connection costs for the high nuclear scenarios.
Nevertheless, even omitting these externalized costs, all nuclear scenarios are still more expensive than those based on wind and solar generation, which do not incur cost over-runs and have proved reliable.
In conclusion the most cost effective near zero electricity (NZE) scenarios for the WA SWIS grid are 95% and 100% RE generation, 95% being achievable by 2035……………. https://reneweconomy.com.au/coalition-nuclear-plan-would-force-consumers-to-wait-20-years-longer-for-30-higher-electricity-bills/
Leadership , (Doom is not inevitable)
There Is No Grudge That Cannot Be Resolved, China’s Xi Jinping Tells Former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou in Momentous Beijing Meeting ScheerPost, https://scheerpost.com/2024/04/10/there-is-no-grudge-that-cannot-be-resolved-chinas-xi-jinping-tells-former-taiwan-president-ma-ying-jeou-in-momentous-beijing-meeting/
OCTOBER 5, 2012, https://www.counterpunch.org/2012/10/05/nuclear-lies-cover-ups-and-secrecy/ Mangano observes: “Nuclear war, like any war, is not an inevitable force of nature, bit a conscious choice of leaders.” (p. 66) So too is any decision to build or maintain a nuclear site.
Patrick Lawrence: ‘Automated Murder’: Israel’s ‘AI’ in Gaza
In the Lavender case, the data it produced were accepted and treated as if they had been generated by a human being without any actual human oversight or independent verification.
A second AI system, sadistically named “Where’s Daddy?”—and how sick is this?—was then used to track Hamas suspects to their homes. The IDF intentionally targeted suspected militants while they were with their families, using unguided missiles or “dumb” bombs. This strategy had the advantage of enabling Israel to preserve its more expensive precision-guided weapons, or “smart” bombs.
“intelligent” weapons proven effective in Gaza were major attractions when Israel marketed them last month at the Singapore Airshow, East Asia’s biggest arms bazaar.
dehumanized, grotesquely technologized future
By Patrick Lawrence and Cara Marianna / Original to ScheerPost, April 9, 2024
ZURICH—“Technological change, while it helps humanity meet the challenges nature imposes upon us, leads to a paradigm shift: It leaves us less capable, not more, of using our intellectual capacities. It diminishes our minds in the long run. We strive to improve ourselves while risking a regression to the Stone Age if our ever more complex, ever more fragile technological infrastructure collapses.”
That is Hans Köchler, an eminent Viennese scholar and president of the International Progress Organization, a globally active think tank, addressing an audience here last Thursday evening, April 4. The date is significant: The day before Köchler spoke, +972 Magazine and Local Call, independent publications in Israel–Palestine, reported that as the Israel Defense Forces press their savage invasion of the Gaza Strip, they deploy an artificial intelligence program called Lavender that so far has marked some 37,000 Palestinians as kill targets. In the early weeks of the Israeli siege, according to the Israeli sources +972 cites, “the army gave sweeping approval for officers to adopt Lavender’s kill lists, with no requirement to thoroughly check why the machine made those choices or to examine the raw intelligence data on which they were based.”
Chilling it was to hear Köchler speak a couple of news cycles after +972 published these revelations, which are based on confidential interviews with six Israeli intelligence officers who have been directly involved in the use of AI to target Palestinians for assassination. “To use technologies to solve all our problems reduces our ability to make decisions,” Köchler asserted. “We’re no longer able to think through problems. They remove us from real life.”
Köchler titled his talk “The Trivialization of Public Space,” and his topic, broadly stated, was the impact of technologies such as digital communications and AI on our brains, our conduct, and altogether our humanity. It was sobering, to put the point mildly, to recognize that Israel’s siege of Gaza, bottomlessly depraved in itself, is an in-our-faces display of the dehumanizing effects these technologies have on all who depend on them.
Let us look on in horror, and let us see our future in it.
We see in the IDF, to make this point another way, a rupture in morality, human intelligence, and responsibility when human oversight is mediated by the algorithms that run AI systems. There is a break between causality and result, action and consequence. And this is exactly what advanced technologies have in store for the rest of humanity. Artificial intelligence, as Köchler put it, is not intelligence: “It is ‘simulated intelligence’ because it has no consciousness of itself.” It isn’t capable, he meant to say, of moral decision-making or ethical accountability.
In the Lavender case, the data it produced were accepted and treated as if they had been generated by a human being without any actual human oversight or independent verification. A second AI system, sadistically named “Where’s Daddy?”—and how sick is this?—was then used to track Hamas suspects to their homes. The IDF intentionally targeted suspected militants while they were with their families, using unguided missiles or “dumb” bombs. This strategy had the advantage of enabling Israel to preserve its more expensive precision-guided weapons, or “smart” bombs.
As one of +972’s sources told the magazine:
We were not interested in killing [Hamas] operatives only when they were in a military building or engaged in a military activity… . On the contrary, the IDF bombed them in homes without hesitation, as a first option. It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.
Once Lavender identified a potential suspect, IDF operatives had about 20 seconds to verify that the target was a male before making the decision to strike. There was no other human analysis of the “raw intelligence data.” The information generated by Lavender was treated as if it was “an order,” sources told +972—an official order to kill. Given the strategy of targeting suspects in their homes, the IDF assigned acceptable kill ratios for its bombing campaigns: 20 to 30 civilians for each junior-level Hamas operative. For Hamas leaders with the rank of battalion or brigade commander, +972’s sources said, “the army on several occasions authorized the killing of more than 100 civilians in the assassination of a single commander.”
In other words, Israeli policy, guided and assisted by AI technology, made it inevitable that thousands of civilians, many of them women and children, would be killed.
There appears to be no record of any other military deploying AI programs such as Lavender and Where’s Daddy? But it is sheer naïveté to assume this diabolic use of advanced technologies will not spread elsewhere. Israel is already the world’s leading exporter of surveillance and digital forensic tools. Anadolu, Turkey’s state-run news agency, reported as far back as February that Israel is using Gaza as a weapons-testing site so that it can market these tools as battle-tested. Antony Lowenstein, an author Anadolu quotes, calls this the marketing of “automated murder.”
And here we find ourselves: Haaretz, the Israeli daily, reported on April 5 that “intelligent” weapons proven effective in Gaza were major attractions when Israel marketed them last month at the Singapore Airshow, East Asia’s biggest arms bazaar. …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
the Biden regime is culpable in inflicting these multiple wounds on humanity in one other dimension we must not miss. With its incessant attempts to suspend us in a virtual reality of its making, distant from what it is doing in our names, it leads us into the dehumanized, grotesquely technologized future Köchler describes just as surely as the Israelis do as they murder human beings wholesale with AI weapons and kill innocent children with remotely controlled sniper drones. https://scheerpost.com/2024/04/09/patrick-lawrence-automated-murder-israels-ai-in-gaza/
1 This month
of the week – Disrupting War & Militarism in Oceania. Active solidarity. Radical practice.
Antinuclear 