[andrewthesmart]

I don't know how you feel about working for the military-industrial-tech-surveillance-state but companies or universities that get DARPA or IARPA money work on stuff like flying and/or self driving cars, autonomous systems etc (Lockheed, Honeywell, Carnegie-Mellon, Raytheon, for examples). Of course these things will ultimately be used to crush humanity's soul, but they're interesting software and technical challenges.

[pilot07]

I work in this industry, and have spent a number of years in R&D. In my experience, the vast majority of software R&D projects are not weapons/military related, and include things such as cyber security, healthcare, big data, cloud computing, etc. A lot of it is aimed at developing innovative approaches to reduce costs in various government/military processes both through automation and doing things more smartly and efficiently.

[gyepi]

Sorry, but I don't think there's a distinction to be made, other than one of degree unless the implication is that improving government/military processes is not aligned with the long term goals of the military.

[pilot07]

Good point, but I think the average person who has reservations about some military functions isn't necessarily wholesale opposed to all functions of the military.

[andrewthesmart]

I was in this business for a while too and did some really cool stuff. But in the end this system transfers public money to enrich these companies; and the DOD basically pays these companies to learn how to develop technology that the company can then make huge profits on. It's a racket. I'm torn about it; philosophically, morally, politically I'm opposed to war and using technology to control people. But the skills I got and the smart people in the industry were great. Plus the projects are cool from like a 13 year old boy perspective, but if you stop to think that big data, autonomous vehicles etc will be used for death and increasing the powerful people's ability to control us, it's might not be worth it.