That is fascinating and informative; thank you for taking the time to write that.
I've no direct knowledge of even the name of the British "firm" (chambers, partnership, etc.) claiming to be responsible for contributing to the creation of the U.S. constitution, though I could probably find out. I was in my post parroting someone who was, however, in the context exceptionally unlikely to be incorrect in making such a statement.
A couple comments, of interest:
"British law firms". No such thing. Law practitioners in what is now the United Kingdom were required to be sole practitioners until the 19th century. The first law firms in the British Empire were established in the 18th century under the auspices of the Quebec Act (1765) which recognized the pre-existence of legal partnerships and corporations under the French system.
I don't know of the Quebec Act (1765), and unfortunately cannot find a reference. It would seemingly predate the United States Constitution (1787), and as a result a limited liability partnership – or in any event the pedigree of such LLP that would subsequently come into being – could very well have made contributions to the Constitution.
I also understand that barristers such as myself were required, until the turn of the 19th century, to be sole practitioners, though barristers often worked out of chambers that shared resources. I also understood that no such restriction applied to solicitors, though that being said you seem more steeped in this genealogy, and I would welcome correction on any distinction between barristers and solicitors insofar as they are required to be sole practitioners.
Certainly I'll see if I can identify and contact the firm to see what their story is, and post if I have any results in that respect.
I just last week had a frank discussion with a former surgeon general about the predecessor article referenced on Slashdot, from the Atlantic Lies, Damned Lies, and Medical Science.
He noted that there was a lot of truth to the article. We discussed a few bases for this phenomenon, most notably:
1. The money: Researchers need funding, but funding is often effectively conditional on a finding of conclusions favourable to the funder (which funders are often either big pharmaceuticals or big governments);
2. The stigma: A "failure" to "prove" a hypothesis looks poorly on a researcher, so they often choose topics that are:
(a) irrelevant and so unlikely to ever be tested in the future; or
(b) trite and so unlikely to fail.
We have created a self-perpetuating system of "research" that leads to few useful results in the form of valuable hypotheticals being tested. Where potentially valuable hypotheses are being "tested" the methods used are often contrived so as to reach a specific conclusion, and unconcerned with the truth. These facades of research designed so as to reach specific conclusions allow companies and governments to market product and policy decisions, respectively, which they consider favourable.
All to say, the finding of a useful truth, although supposedly the object of scientific research and generally considered to be at least an incidental consequence of our economic system through e.g. the market's invisible hand, is in practice in the Western world at best irrelevant and at worst heavily counter-incentivized.
The absence of consequence – the curse of affluence – serves to perpetuate an increasing disconnect between reality and the publications that peddle the results of research.
The 4th amendment is specifically worded to prevent that sort of abuse. (before this, in England, probable cause was "required", but refusal WAS probable cause in the law's eyes, so it didn't matter) I don't see why simply having a judge on site changes anything. Actually I don't see why they can even do that do you once they haul you off to jail for refusal. It probably comes back to your agreeing to the test as a condition for receiving your state-issued drivers' license?
Sir –
As a matter of interest, I understand many of the amendments (including the 4th) were crafted by British law firms. Whether that was in response to the problem (in the eyes of the law firm) of refusal constituting probable cause in England is a matter of some debate, as the British didn't have at the time a written constitution giving rights to refusal (i.e. it was in the eyes of the House of Lords what constituted the constitution, and such constitution was... ephemeral).
The act of a Florida Judge being on site is probably, I speculate, for for two reasons: 1. to determine character as appropriate, and 2. vivo voce evidence. Both of these reasons are to circumvent procedural issues in the execution of Florida's criminal law -- which procedure arises from long-standing common law protections; an effort to lead to greater useful convictions as an act of deterrence by the state. Whether such is the outcome is to be seen.
While I may be wrong, I suspect the matter of satisfying "probable cause" for the purpose of search or seizure may be at most incidental to the real issue, which is circumventing or obviating procedural requirements by having a Judge present -- in terms of writing a decision that accords with the facts at the incident, by way of character assessment and vivo voce evidence the Judge can assess and conclude at the scene.
In other words, this is not about searching, seizing, or issuing warrants (4th amendment rights/protections), but about achieving conviction based on "evidence" (a stronger sentiment legally than statements or testimony of police officers) at the scene by way of a Judge who may "determine" (a specific word leading to conclusion, legally at first instance) such facts as based on observations and statements made in the presence of a Judge.
I make no speculation or conclusion about the efficacy of such presence by Judges, though it is interesting, but perhaps not for reasons alluded to elsewhere in the comments -- which unalluded-to reasons I thought to mention, above.
I also reserve opinion on the appropriateness of Judges being present at the scene, though their separation from convictions as a statistic (viz. sin-qua-non, unlike many police districts) could potentially alleviate expense for wrongful convictions.
As a matter of policy, such acts of presence may perhaps serve to erode either the separation of Judges from their (perceived) impartiality or the public from expected (perceived) impartiality.
On the other hand, wikileaks leaked their own donors list. As far as I know its not illegal to donate to wikileaks, even if mastercard, visa, paypal and BoA say otherwise, so maybe you do have a point.
Sir –
Incidentally, if you wish to make an anonymous donation to Wikileaks from a common law country (Australia, Canada, U.S., Great Britain, etc) you can give the money to a law firm and ask that they make the donation out of their trust account anonymously. In general, a retained law firm is barred by confidentiality to not disclose that you are even a client, and thanks to the client-solicitor privilege they cannot be forced to disclose that relationship by a Court except in a rare set of particular circumstances.
This is, of course, a general rule and not legal advice you should rely on. Ask the law firm what protections in the form of privacy, confidentiality and privilege they provide for you if you wish to make an anonymous donation to Wikileaks through them, and under what circumstances your identity and donation could be disclosed by way of Court order or otherwise.
For further protection, you could ask the law firm you retain to retain another law firm to make the donation.
Some firms may not wish to engage in this practice, and indeed may be barred from doing so by way of their respective law society or applicable legislation, but if they are it is certainly a measure of anonymity with seasoned and tested protections that's not easily accessible by any other means.
One response is the creation of a procedural mechanism whereby a class of defendants for whom the common issues of fact and law are determined together can be used to expedite the determination of fault by the masses. While a class of plaintiffs is certainly more common and intuitive, it's certainly not the only possible mechanism for Courts resolving issues that affect large numbers of individuals.
Some jurisdictions have had such mechanisms since the early 1990's.
Actively interfering with business can be a legitimate form of protest. In this case, I don't feel that it's right, since Amazon was forced to either capitulate or risk significant reprisals from the US government. It would be like blacks staging a sit-in at a privately owned diner, that was ordered by the feds to segregate, the owners of the diner aren't really the ones you should be pissed at.
Sir —
Except that the feds created and implemented the "no blacks at the diner" law without any act of legislation or even any discussion with the public or elected officials, and employed this law without any judicial – or other – oversight to convict a defendant without any presentation of charges or evidence or even any real process at all and then executed a mandatory order (of the injunction flavour) to prevent a company from doing business with that supposed defendant on the basis of that conviction. No, rather all this occurred with a phone call from a junior senator.
Of such a senator's call, how jealous would the residents of Jessup County have been in 1964! (That's a reference to Mississippi Burning)
Amazon folded. They didn't even know if the feds even had a hand – much less what may have been in said hand.
I suppose, though, it's not Amazon's sworn duty to uphold the constitution...
A. The government is taking down domain names without warrants B. The government is pressuring hosts to remove services C. The government is encouraging if not mandating ISP to throttle bit torrents D. The government is tracking US citizens Via their Credit cards, telephone conversations, Internet traffic and cellphones without warrants. E. All sorts of other nefarious things we aren't aware of yet..
If the government fails in these efforts to silence Wikileaks and others, then the internet shall have succeeded in doing what it was designed to do: route around censorship as if it were damage, to borrow a phrase from John Gilmore. Perhaps the Department of Defence shall have succeeded in creating a mechanism for protecting the interests of the United States of America from enemies of free speech within, if indeed that was part of the mandate of ARPAnet.
Certainly I believe that for the United States to survive what seems to be Roman-esque decay, it must find an equilibrium of socio-political forces I believe attainable only by way of open government. Disclosing diplomatic cables probably isn't the openness needed or desired per-se, but hopefully the possibility of such disclosure shall lead to better openness in other areas that furthers the possibility of such equilibrium.
Whenever a system is policed only by itself, and accessible only to itself, the answer is simple, though difficult to gain acceptance:
Establishing oversight from a group outside the community in question, with the power to levy changes and punishment on it, and which by mandate must remain neutral and apart from outside political interests. It is preferable, though not always practical, for these to be elected positions.
You've described the rationale behind the common law judicial system. It's a good rationale, but it's not an alternative to what we have.
You have a very persuasive argument, except you neglect one minor detail: You assume people will take the moral high ground when money is involved. They usually don't. Lawyers aren't any different than Joe Q. Public on the street, excepting that they dress better, make somewhat more money, and (hopefully) are somewhat better trained for their professional field than most.
It is true, and the theme of your post is pursuasive. There are numerous arbitrary and high barriers to entry to effective legal persuasion, not least of which is the need for a lawyer to effectively engage the system.
That being said, in my experience, even after explanation the vast majority of the population lack the ability to understand issues and form concise, sensible arguments on one side or the other of the issues (concise is important because the general response to a failure to understand issues is to verbose verbiage).
To most lawyers, the messes created by the self-represented are often impermeable to the discourse that leads to efficient resolution. That doesn't take away from the access to justice argument you put forward - the law should be clearer and easier to access - but at the same time it's often cheaper and more effective for people to pay a lawyer than self-represent (and that's why most educated people do). I think legal aid is a reasonable solution in many cases - but it has its drawbacks as well (it discourages early settlement, for example).
Finally, it's a central point of economics that specialization creates wealth. Having lawyers allows for more efficient use of the available time and energy of the population; it'd be absurdly inefficient for police, doctors, engineers, janitors, miners, etc., to spend the extraordinary amount of effort necessary to understand every facet of every issue of every dispute that occurs in their lives. Furthermore, the cost to the taxpayer of having the uneducated aggrieved senselessly stand in front of judges for hours bantering about irrelevant points is an enormous cost to society; I find myself regularly reducing well intentioned but misdirected efforts of clients down to the salient points. It's better that a client pay me to do this than the taxpayer, otherwise we create a moral hazard.
Additionally, your argument loses a lot of its intellectual purity and moral superiority when you make the reductio ad absurdum argument in paragraph two. Your post would have gone better without that.
I'm notsureitwasabsurd. You can see from those links what happens in the absence of a rule-of-law dispute resolution procedure: Violence. It's not absurd, it's not even hyperbole, it's the natural consequence of the demand for justice (in some form, to someone) and the absence of the supply of "justice" (or the appearance of justice, or a justice-like substitute).
Lastly, there is no transparency in the legal system and you're being intellectually dishonest to state otherwise: The legal system is incredibly complex and largely unavailable to the poor. When you have a system that necessitates the use of lawyers and attorneys in every legal preceding, to the point that attempting to advance a case pro se is laughed at by every judge and legal professional -- what then can we honestly say about transparency in the system? If the system requires experts that are licensed through the state to interpret or apply its rules, then the system is not transparent. In fact, it is utterly impervious to external examination, and any protests against it are swiftly dismissed as "uneducated" or rogue. The system is self-contradictory: Pract
Famous qoute, "First Kill all the lawyers" seems apropos.
Sir —
Indeed, if you wish to give the rich even greater arbitrary and unfettered powers. Please allow me to present some choice quotes:
"Those who use this phrase pejoratively against lawyers are as miserably misguided about their Shakespeare as they are about the judicial system which they disdain so freely."
"The first thing we do," said the character in Shakespeare's Henry VI, is "kill all the lawyers." Contrary to popular belief, the proposal was not designed to restore sanity to commercial life. Rather, it was intended to eliminate those who might stand in the way of a contemplated revolution -- thus underscoring the important role that lawyers can play in society.
– and –
As the famous remark by the plotter of treachery in Shakespeare's King Henry VI shows - "The first thing we must do is kill all the lawyers," - the surest way to chaos and tyranny even then was to remove the guardians of independent thinking.
Who do you think sets up any framework for regulatory consequences or enactment of discipline of the stooges for the RIAA?
What exactly do you think would happen in the absence of any such a framework or discipline?
And I know it probably wasn't what was intended within the context of the play, but it sure does seem correct now.
With respect, to quote "First kill all the lawyers" as an argument that being rid of lawyers will result in fewer 'bullies' like the RIAA taking advantage of the poor is absurd and ignorant, not insightful.
Indeed, to quote the article, "The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) said last year it would take action against the pair, and has now laid out its case, claiming Gore and Miller were fully aware that the IP data they used to identify accused file-sharers was flawed."
So you propose that we disban and disburse the SRA right at the moment they intend to engage in a process of rectification? You would instead prefer that all the lawyers and the rule of law be disbanded? What punishment then - if any - would you propose to eke out for these defendant lawyers, and on what basis would you make such punishment? How would you bring about a fair process and consistent judgments? Whom do you propose is fit to evaluate the facts and fairness of any punishment, and what limits - if any - do you propose? Should we chop off their heads? How about stoning them? What about their family, children, secretaries, barbers? They all benefitted from the defendants actions. Should we not punish them, too? What about their neighbours, they're probably lawyers too. Why not burn all their houses down?
Or, here's a thought: Why don't we set up a transparent system for evaluating wrongful conduct that's evaluated by impartial individuals with experience in the resolution of disputes and knowledge and insight into a proper measure of punishment. Oh, wait, that's what's happening.
I would think this is exactly the opposite of the time when getting rid of lawyers seems appropriate; it is lawyers who have identified the ill treatment of the public by the accused, lawyers who will pursue a case to bring about justice, and lawyers who will evaluate the wrong and determine the appropriateness of a remedy against them. What judge, jury and executioner do you propose replace all these lawyers?
You can be rid of the bastions of knowledge and reason – lawyers – only at the peril of the concept of principle itself.
Ever seen a 50-year-old ER nurse? 90% of the time, they are callused to the suffering around them. It comes with repeated exposure to the environment, and although their demeanor may seem rough to others, they are extremely efficient and skilled.
Sir –
I don't disagree with your point that repeated exposure to the environment makes one rough. I do have a different perspective on the effects of that.
In my experience most really good nurses quit because of the way they're treated by the condescension of doctors and entitlement of patients, as well as the toll of watching and caring about patients who suffer morbidity and death.
The nurses that stick it out are able to do so precisely because they don't care — about the way they're treated or how patents turn out. At the same time they aren't competent or ambitious enough to find something else to do that doesn't take such a toll.
Few calloused 50-year-old ER nurses are in it because they care. If they don't care, then you're an object to them.
There are of course exceptions, especially in e.g. teaching hospitals, but I suspect they're be very rare in the nursing industry.
Ridiculous numbers, because no such train exists that can travel that speed between NYC and LA, and even if it did exist it would certainly make multiple stops.
Sir –
Yes, one would need to build the rail link. There's no reason it would need to stop in between, though it certainly could. Wikipedia's article on high-speed rail states:
The world record for conventional high-speed rail is held by the V150, a specially configured version of Alstom's TGV which clocked 574.8 km/h (357.2 mph) on a test run. The world speed record for Maglev is held by the Japanese experimental MLX01: 581 km/h (361 mph).
One must commercialize that and lay the tracks, which is daunting to be sure; there are alternatively existing commercialized trains that can travel at 431km/h, which still is no easy feat to implement. But it is certainly possible.
You also shouldn't introduce the sources of error against the assumptions on the train side without also discussing the same type of errors on the plane side. It's equally ridiculous to think that you can fly from NYC to LA in 6h 10min as it is ridiculous to suggest a train is comparable, because the flight requires significant extra time to commute to and from an airport, the time to get through security, the boarding time, the departure time, the luggage wait and pickup time, which often ends up being an extra 2 - 5 hours. Now you're looking at 8 - 11 hours for a flight from NYC to LA. A reasonably direct route high-speed train could be in that ballpark, but with much greater comfort. Nevertheless, a plane is probably going to be better on gas, the environment, and your wallet than a train over such a distance.
In any event, the point of my post was simply to speculate about the comparability of the two types of travel in terms of time to cross from NY to LA. That you're unable to understand or respond to such a hypothetical with anything either informative or constructive suggests that perhaps we would all be better off if you just, respectfully of course, kept such opinions to yourself.
Current fastest train: approx. 574.8 km/h (making the time approx. 6h 50min)
Ignoring the early arrival time at the airport, drive to/from the airport, and similar slowdowns that may be applicable to a train (and supposing there was actually a high speed rail), etc., there's roughly an hour of in difference in the travel time.
Even in this universe, there are uncountably many uncomputable transcendentals.
Oh yes, quite right! I meant the opposite of what I said...:)
My great-grandparent post was under the seemingly mistaken impression that "transcendental" referred to a distinct subset of the reals, something like "the reals with a well-defined Taylor series that are not algebraic", but instead (per Wikipedia) it appears to be "the reals that are not algebraic", which is a vastly larger set.
I seem to recall seeing (or maybe it was just hypothesizing) a map from the set of all Taylor series onto the real numbers (indeed, the complex numbers). In other words, there is no transcendental number that cannot be arrived at by way of a Taylor series. As well, there is no convergent Taylor series (do they converge by definition?) that cannot be represented by a complex number.
Transcendentals would, I believe, be the set of all numbers that are not countable, or countable combinations of countable sets – i.e. not algebraic. I believe this is the same as saying that the transcendentals are the set of complex numbers less all sets of polynomials with rational or root coefficients.
So I think you were right that transcendentals may be the set of Taylor series that are not algebraic, which is also the set of reals that are not algebraic. The error is overestimating the size of the prior, which it turns out is the same set as the latter. Or so it would seem!:)
They have the same cardinality: countably infinite. In other words, there's an isomorphism between the even numbers (integers, I presume) and the integers. They are, in terms of the quality of their infinity, the same. Contrast: the uncountably infinite (e.g. transcendentals).
Wait, nevermind. I seem to be confused about something, Wikipedia says the transcendentals are uncountable.
In another universe, perhaps they are...
For the rest of us, Taylor series are the best oculus I can think of into the known transcendentals (Pi, e, sin(a/b), etc.). However, most transcendentals will remain obscure by virtue of being irrelevant.
The rational numbers are infinite, the irrational numbers are infinite, add them together and you have the real numbers, which is a "larger" infinite set than the rational numbers (and probably the irrationals, though I can't say for sure since I've never attempted that proof).
Quite right. There are two types of infinite cardinality: countable and uncountable. Countable encompasses the set of rational numbers, and calculable irrationals such as roots and all polynomial combinations of the those for which there is an isomorphic map onto the set of integers. Then there's the greater set, the uncountably infinite, e.g. the transcendental numbers and their ilk.
I doubt the cardinality of real numbers would be greater than irrationals themselves, since most numbers are transcendental. It'd be like taking a teaspoon of water out of the ocean and wondering if it's still the ocean.
Back to monkeys: One of infinite monkeys or infinite time may be a greater infinite than the other (i.e. uncountable), if only one of time or space maps onto the set of integers. Not that it changes the outcome: Shakespeare's works; but it's a good brain teaser.
No, you can't, because copyright isn't property. It's a state-granted theoretically-temporary entitlement of monopoly to a particular set of words, sounds, or images. You're not stealing the property, you're violating the monopoly. That's not the same thing.
You're right that copyright infringement ought not be called 'stealing'. However, challenging the qualification of copyright being 'property' on the basis that it's a state-granted fiction is a red herring. All notions of property are fictions (even in the corporeal sense, if your state endorses torture).
Ones home isn't property, either, by the rationale put forward. It's also a state-granted entitlement of a monopoly ("proprietary interest", if you will) to a particular piece of property. You have no more right to copy music than use your neighbours toilet. Your neighbour might not mind that, and there may be no or nominal loss to the neighbour. But the absence of harm and the indifference of your neighbour doesn't mean you have a right to use his toilet -- your neighbour has an exclusive right to enjoy his property, by virtue of his title (or lease). Much as it is with copyright -- except instead of the exclusive right to enjoyment, it's the right to not have your copyright infringed by e.g. copying without permission. The concept of property is created and enforced by the state (notwithstanding vigilantism, which is generally illegal under the rule of law), whether that property is your home, your car, or your copyrightable works. It is all a legal fiction.
The *morality* of enforcing those different concepts of property is a different story, and calling copyright infringement 'stealing' is at-best misleading, but that's not to say it isn't an enforceable form of proprietary interest (i.e. property).
It's dense and relatively long, but perhaps this well reasoned article will offer some food for thought, or even guidance: "The Right to Privacy", Warren and Brandeis Harvard Law Review. Vol. IV December 15, 1890 No. 5.
To some people, a "liberal" is someone who believes the government should take care of people who have been left behind someway in the economic process, the unemployed, the homeless, those who are at a disadvantage in some way. Under that point of view, Cuba should be considered one of the most "liberal" regimes in the world.
Ironically, the welfare state (which concept I believe subsumes what you've described as what some people call "liberal") was originally a conservative concept, founded on the idea that if people needn't be concerned about risk (e.g. to their health) they will be able to do more work.
You're right! Good catch. It was around 1998-99, in Fredericton, New Brunswick. I seem to recall NB Tel was at the time a testbed for Nortel and perhaps other telecom equipment makers. I also seem to recall NB Tel was, with Sasktel, the first DSL provider in Canada... but alas I can't remember or find a web-site to verify that.
In any event, it was around ten years ago I had the same speed of internet access that I have now...
I'm now living in a major urban metropolis and I've got the same crappy DSL internet that I had in rural Canada in 1995. 5mbps. On that basis I conclude that whatever the powers-that-be are doing to stimulate innovation, it's been a failure. Utterly. Sigh.
Slashdot Mirror
Sir —
That is fascinating and informative; thank you for taking the time to write that.
I've no direct knowledge of even the name of the British "firm" (chambers, partnership, etc.) claiming to be responsible for contributing to the creation of the U.S. constitution, though I could probably find out. I was in my post parroting someone who was, however, in the context exceptionally unlikely to be incorrect in making such a statement.
A couple comments, of interest:
"British law firms". No such thing. Law practitioners in what is now the United Kingdom were required to be sole practitioners until the 19th century. The first law firms in the British Empire were established in the 18th century under the auspices of the Quebec Act (1765) which recognized the pre-existence of legal partnerships and corporations under the French system.
I don't know of the Quebec Act (1765), and unfortunately cannot find a reference. It would seemingly predate the United States Constitution (1787), and as a result a limited liability partnership – or in any event the pedigree of such LLP that would subsequently come into being – could very well have made contributions to the Constitution.
I also understand that barristers such as myself were required, until the turn of the 19th century, to be sole practitioners, though barristers often worked out of chambers that shared resources. I also understood that no such restriction applied to solicitors, though that being said you seem more steeped in this genealogy, and I would welcome correction on any distinction between barristers and solicitors insofar as they are required to be sole practitioners.
Certainly I'll see if I can identify and contact the firm to see what their story is, and post if I have any results in that respect.
I just last week had a frank discussion with a former surgeon general about the predecessor article referenced on Slashdot, from the Atlantic Lies, Damned Lies, and Medical Science.
He noted that there was a lot of truth to the article. We discussed a few bases for this phenomenon, most notably:
1. The money: Researchers need funding, but funding is often effectively conditional on a finding of conclusions favourable to the funder (which funders are often either big pharmaceuticals or big governments);
2. The stigma: A "failure" to "prove" a hypothesis looks poorly on a researcher, so they often choose topics that are:
(a) irrelevant and so unlikely to ever be tested in the future; or
(b) trite and so unlikely to fail.
We have created a self-perpetuating system of "research" that leads to few useful results in the form of valuable hypotheticals being tested. Where potentially valuable hypotheses are being "tested" the methods used are often contrived so as to reach a specific conclusion, and unconcerned with the truth. These facades of research designed so as to reach specific conclusions allow companies and governments to market product and policy decisions, respectively, which they consider favourable.
All to say, the finding of a useful truth, although supposedly the object of scientific research and generally considered to be at least an incidental consequence of our economic system through e.g. the market's invisible hand, is in practice in the Western world at best irrelevant and at worst heavily counter-incentivized.
The absence of consequence – the curse of affluence – serves to perpetuate an increasing disconnect between reality and the publications that peddle the results of research.
The 4th amendment is specifically worded to prevent that sort of abuse. (before this, in England, probable cause was "required", but refusal WAS probable cause in the law's eyes, so it didn't matter) I don't see why simply having a judge on site changes anything. Actually I don't see why they can even do that do you once they haul you off to jail for refusal. It probably comes back to your agreeing to the test as a condition for receiving your state-issued drivers' license?
Sir –
As a matter of interest, I understand many of the amendments (including the 4th) were crafted by British law firms. Whether that was in response to the problem (in the eyes of the law firm) of refusal constituting probable cause in England is a matter of some debate, as the British didn't have at the time a written constitution giving rights to refusal (i.e. it was in the eyes of the House of Lords what constituted the constitution, and such constitution was ... ephemeral).
The act of a Florida Judge being on site is probably, I speculate, for for two reasons: 1. to determine character as appropriate, and 2. vivo voce evidence. Both of these reasons are to circumvent procedural issues in the execution of Florida's criminal law -- which procedure arises from long-standing common law protections; an effort to lead to greater useful convictions as an act of deterrence by the state. Whether such is the outcome is to be seen.
While I may be wrong, I suspect the matter of satisfying "probable cause" for the purpose of search or seizure may be at most incidental to the real issue, which is circumventing or obviating procedural requirements by having a Judge present -- in terms of writing a decision that accords with the facts at the incident, by way of character assessment and vivo voce evidence the Judge can assess and conclude at the scene.
In other words, this is not about searching, seizing, or issuing warrants (4th amendment rights/protections), but about achieving conviction based on "evidence" (a stronger sentiment legally than statements or testimony of police officers) at the scene by way of a Judge who may "determine" (a specific word leading to conclusion, legally at first instance) such facts as based on observations and statements made in the presence of a Judge.
I make no speculation or conclusion about the efficacy of such presence by Judges, though it is interesting, but perhaps not for reasons alluded to elsewhere in the comments -- which unalluded-to reasons I thought to mention, above.
I also reserve opinion on the appropriateness of Judges being present at the scene, though their separation from convictions as a statistic (viz. sin-qua-non, unlike many police districts) could potentially alleviate expense for wrongful convictions.
As a matter of policy, such acts of presence may perhaps serve to erode either the separation of Judges from their (perceived) impartiality or the public from expected (perceived) impartiality.
The judge failed to do his job, and so should be disbarred and possibly subject to other penalties.
Some trivia:
A Judge is "removed". A lawyer is "disbarred".
Judge is to job as lawyer is to status (relationship: "has a").
On the other hand, wikileaks leaked their own donors list. As far as I know its not illegal to donate to wikileaks, even if mastercard, visa, paypal and BoA say otherwise, so maybe you do have a point.
Sir –
Incidentally, if you wish to make an anonymous donation to Wikileaks from a common law country (Australia, Canada, U.S., Great Britain, etc) you can give the money to a law firm and ask that they make the donation out of their trust account anonymously. In general, a retained law firm is barred by confidentiality to not disclose that you are even a client, and thanks to the client-solicitor privilege they cannot be forced to disclose that relationship by a Court except in a rare set of particular circumstances.
This is, of course, a general rule and not legal advice you should rely on. Ask the law firm what protections in the form of privacy, confidentiality and privilege they provide for you if you wish to make an anonymous donation to Wikileaks through them, and under what circumstances your identity and donation could be disclosed by way of Court order or otherwise.
For further protection, you could ask the law firm you retain to retain another law firm to make the donation.
Some firms may not wish to engage in this practice, and indeed may be barred from doing so by way of their respective law society or applicable legislation, but if they are it is certainly a measure of anonymity with seasoned and tested protections that's not easily accessible by any other means.
One response is the creation of a procedural mechanism whereby a class of defendants for whom the common issues of fact and law are determined together can be used to expedite the determination of fault by the masses. While a class of plaintiffs is certainly more common and intuitive, it's certainly not the only possible mechanism for Courts resolving issues that affect large numbers of individuals.
Some jurisdictions have had such mechanisms since the early 1990's.
Actively interfering with business can be a legitimate form of protest. In this case, I don't feel that it's right, since Amazon was forced to either capitulate or risk significant reprisals from the US government. It would be like blacks staging a sit-in at a privately owned diner, that was ordered by the feds to segregate, the owners of the diner aren't really the ones you should be pissed at.
Sir —
Except that the feds created and implemented the "no blacks at the diner" law without any act of legislation or even any discussion with the public or elected officials, and employed this law without any judicial – or other – oversight to convict a defendant without any presentation of charges or evidence or even any real process at all and then executed a mandatory order (of the injunction flavour) to prevent a company from doing business with that supposed defendant on the basis of that conviction. No, rather all this occurred with a phone call from a junior senator.
Of such a senator's call, how jealous would the residents of Jessup County have been in 1964! (That's a reference to Mississippi Burning)
Amazon folded. They didn't even know if the feds even had a hand – much less what may have been in said hand.
I suppose, though, it's not Amazon's sworn duty to uphold the constitution ...
A. The government is taking down domain names without warrants
B. The government is pressuring hosts to remove services
C. The government is encouraging if not mandating ISP to throttle bit torrents
D. The government is tracking US citizens Via their Credit cards, telephone conversations, Internet traffic and cellphones without warrants.
E. All sorts of other nefarious things we aren't aware of yet..
If the government fails in these efforts to silence Wikileaks and others, then the internet shall have succeeded in doing what it was designed to do: route around censorship as if it were damage, to borrow a phrase from John Gilmore. Perhaps the Department of Defence shall have succeeded in creating a mechanism for protecting the interests of the United States of America from enemies of free speech within, if indeed that was part of the mandate of ARPAnet.
Certainly I believe that for the United States to survive what seems to be Roman-esque decay, it must find an equilibrium of socio-political forces I believe attainable only by way of open government. Disclosing diplomatic cables probably isn't the openness needed or desired per-se, but hopefully the possibility of such disclosure shall lead to better openness in other areas that furthers the possibility of such equilibrium.
The rationale, yes. But I think we could do better. Of course, discussing how would take many, many books... and it's early on a monday.
A wise man once told me: You must master a system before you can change it.
You should write these books, but consider bearing that in mind.
Whenever a system is policed only by itself, and accessible only to itself, the answer is simple, though difficult to gain acceptance:
Establishing oversight from a group outside the community in question, with the power to levy changes and punishment on it, and which by mandate must remain neutral and apart from outside political interests. It is preferable, though not always practical, for these to be elected positions.
You've described the rationale behind the common law judicial system. It's a good rationale, but it's not an alternative to what we have.
Sir –
You have a very persuasive argument, except you neglect one minor detail: You assume people will take the moral high ground when money is involved. They usually don't. Lawyers aren't any different than Joe Q. Public on the street, excepting that they dress better, make somewhat more money, and (hopefully) are somewhat better trained for their professional field than most.
It is true, and the theme of your post is pursuasive. There are numerous arbitrary and high barriers to entry to effective legal persuasion, not least of which is the need for a lawyer to effectively engage the system.
That being said, in my experience, even after explanation the vast majority of the population lack the ability to understand issues and form concise, sensible arguments on one side or the other of the issues (concise is important because the general response to a failure to understand issues is to verbose verbiage).
To most lawyers, the messes created by the self-represented are often impermeable to the discourse that leads to efficient resolution. That doesn't take away from the access to justice argument you put forward - the law should be clearer and easier to access - but at the same time it's often cheaper and more effective for people to pay a lawyer than self-represent (and that's why most educated people do). I think legal aid is a reasonable solution in many cases - but it has its drawbacks as well (it discourages early settlement, for example).
Finally, it's a central point of economics that specialization creates wealth. Having lawyers allows for more efficient use of the available time and energy of the population; it'd be absurdly inefficient for police, doctors, engineers, janitors, miners, etc., to spend the extraordinary amount of effort necessary to understand every facet of every issue of every dispute that occurs in their lives. Furthermore, the cost to the taxpayer of having the uneducated aggrieved senselessly stand in front of judges for hours bantering about irrelevant points is an enormous cost to society; I find myself regularly reducing well intentioned but misdirected efforts of clients down to the salient points. It's better that a client pay me to do this than the taxpayer, otherwise we create a moral hazard.
Additionally, your argument loses a lot of its intellectual purity and moral superiority when you make the reductio ad absurdum argument in paragraph two. Your post would have gone better without that.
I'm not sure it was absurd. You can see from those links what happens in the absence of a rule-of-law dispute resolution procedure: Violence. It's not absurd, it's not even hyperbole, it's the natural consequence of the demand for justice (in some form, to someone) and the absence of the supply of "justice" (or the appearance of justice, or a justice-like substitute).
Lastly, there is no transparency in the legal system and you're being intellectually dishonest to state otherwise: The legal system is incredibly complex and largely unavailable to the poor. When you have a system that necessitates the use of lawyers and attorneys in every legal preceding, to the point that attempting to advance a case pro se is laughed at by every judge and legal professional -- what then can we honestly say about transparency in the system? If the system requires experts that are licensed through the state to interpret or apply its rules, then the system is not transparent. In fact, it is utterly impervious to external examination, and any protests against it are swiftly dismissed as "uneducated" or rogue. The system is self-contradictory: Pract
Famous qoute, "First Kill all the lawyers" seems apropos.
Sir —
Indeed, if you wish to give the rich even greater arbitrary and unfettered powers. Please allow me to present some choice quotes:
"Those who use this phrase pejoratively against lawyers are as miserably misguided about their Shakespeare as they are about the judicial system which they disdain so freely."
From: http://www.howardnations.com/shakespeare.html
"The first thing we do," said the character in Shakespeare's Henry VI, is "kill all the lawyers." Contrary to popular belief, the proposal was not designed to restore sanity to commercial life. Rather, it was intended to eliminate those who might stand in the way of a contemplated revolution -- thus underscoring the important role that lawyers can play in society.
– and –
As the famous remark by the plotter of treachery in Shakespeare's King Henry VI shows - "The first thing we must do is kill all the lawyers," - the surest way to chaos and tyranny even then was to remove the guardians of independent thinking.
From: http://www.spectacle.org/797/finkel.html
Who do you think sets up any framework for regulatory consequences or enactment of discipline of the stooges for the RIAA?
What exactly do you think would happen in the absence of any such a framework or discipline?
And I know it probably wasn't what was intended within the context of the play, but it sure does seem correct now.
With respect, to quote "First kill all the lawyers" as an argument that being rid of lawyers will result in fewer 'bullies' like the RIAA taking advantage of the poor is absurd and ignorant, not insightful.
Indeed, to quote the article, "The Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) said last year it would take action against the pair, and has now laid out its case, claiming Gore and Miller were fully aware that the IP data they used to identify accused file-sharers was flawed."
So you propose that we disban and disburse the SRA right at the moment they intend to engage in a process of rectification? You would instead prefer that all the lawyers and the rule of law be disbanded? What punishment then - if any - would you propose to eke out for these defendant lawyers, and on what basis would you make such punishment? How would you bring about a fair process and consistent judgments? Whom do you propose is fit to evaluate the facts and fairness of any punishment, and what limits - if any - do you propose? Should we chop off their heads? How about stoning them? What about their family, children, secretaries, barbers? They all benefitted from the defendants actions. Should we not punish them, too? What about their neighbours, they're probably lawyers too. Why not burn all their houses down?
Or, here's a thought: Why don't we set up a transparent system for evaluating wrongful conduct that's evaluated by impartial individuals with experience in the resolution of disputes and knowledge and insight into a proper measure of punishment. Oh, wait, that's what's happening.
I would think this is exactly the opposite of the time when getting rid of lawyers seems appropriate; it is lawyers who have identified the ill treatment of the public by the accused, lawyers who will pursue a case to bring about justice, and lawyers who will evaluate the wrong and determine the appropriateness of a remedy against them. What judge, jury and executioner do you propose replace all these lawyers?
You can be rid of the bastions of knowledge and reason – lawyers – only at the peril of the concept of principle itself.
Ever seen a 50-year-old ER nurse? 90% of the time, they are callused to the suffering around them. It comes with repeated exposure to the environment, and although their demeanor may seem rough to others, they are extremely efficient and skilled.
Sir –
I don't disagree with your point that repeated exposure to the environment makes one rough. I do have a different perspective on the effects of that.
In my experience most really good nurses quit because of the way they're treated by the condescension of doctors and entitlement of patients, as well as the toll of watching and caring about patients who suffer morbidity and death.
The nurses that stick it out are able to do so precisely because they don't care — about the way they're treated or how patents turn out. At the same time they aren't competent or ambitious enough to find something else to do that doesn't take such a toll.
Few calloused 50-year-old ER nurses are in it because they care. If they don't care, then you're an object to them.
There are of course exceptions, especially in e.g. teaching hospitals, but I suspect they're be very rare in the nursing industry.
Ridiculous numbers, because no such train exists that can travel that speed between NYC and LA, and even if it did exist it would certainly make multiple stops.
Sir –
Yes, one would need to build the rail link. There's no reason it would need to stop in between, though it certainly could. Wikipedia's article on high-speed rail states:
The world record for conventional high-speed rail is held by the V150, a specially configured version of Alstom's TGV which clocked 574.8 km/h (357.2 mph) on a test run. The world speed record for Maglev is held by the Japanese experimental MLX01: 581 km/h (361 mph).
One must commercialize that and lay the tracks, which is daunting to be sure; there are alternatively existing commercialized trains that can travel at 431km/h, which still is no easy feat to implement. But it is certainly possible.
You also shouldn't introduce the sources of error against the assumptions on the train side without also discussing the same type of errors on the plane side. It's equally ridiculous to think that you can fly from NYC to LA in 6h 10min as it is ridiculous to suggest a train is comparable, because the flight requires significant extra time to commute to and from an airport, the time to get through security, the boarding time, the departure time, the luggage wait and pickup time, which often ends up being an extra 2 - 5 hours. Now you're looking at 8 - 11 hours for a flight from NYC to LA. A reasonably direct route high-speed train could be in that ballpark, but with much greater comfort. Nevertheless, a plane is probably going to be better on gas, the environment, and your wallet than a train over such a distance.
In any event, the point of my post was simply to speculate about the comparability of the two types of travel in terms of time to cross from NY to LA. That you're unable to understand or respond to such a hypothetical with anything either informative or constructive suggests that perhaps we would all be better off if you just, respectfully of course, kept such opinions to yourself.
Just mixing some numbers as food for thought.
Distance from LA to NY: 3932.80 km.
NY-LA Flight: 6h 10min (average speed approx. 655 km/h)
Current fastest train: approx. 574.8 km/h (making the time approx. 6h 50min)
Ignoring the early arrival time at the airport, drive to/from the airport, and similar slowdowns that may be applicable to a train (and supposing there was actually a high speed rail), etc., there's roughly an hour of in difference in the travel time.
Even in this universe, there are uncountably many uncomputable transcendentals.
Oh yes, quite right! I meant the opposite of what I said ... :)
My great-grandparent post was under the seemingly mistaken impression that "transcendental" referred to a distinct subset of the reals, something like "the reals with a well-defined Taylor series that are not algebraic", but instead (per Wikipedia) it appears to be "the reals that are not algebraic", which is a vastly larger set.
I seem to recall seeing (or maybe it was just hypothesizing) a map from the set of all Taylor series onto the real numbers (indeed, the complex numbers). In other words, there is no transcendental number that cannot be arrived at by way of a Taylor series. As well, there is no convergent Taylor series (do they converge by definition?) that cannot be represented by a complex number.
Transcendentals would, I believe, be the set of all numbers that are not countable, or countable combinations of countable sets – i.e. not algebraic. I believe this is the same as saying that the transcendentals are the set of complex numbers less all sets of polynomials with rational or root coefficients.
So I think you were right that transcendentals may be the set of Taylor series that are not algebraic, which is also the set of reals that are not algebraic. The error is overestimating the size of the prior, which it turns out is the same set as the latter. Or so it would seem! :)
Are there more even numbers or more integers?
They have the same cardinality: countably infinite. In other words, there's an isomorphism between the even numbers (integers, I presume) and the integers. They are, in terms of the quality of their infinity, the same. Contrast: the uncountably infinite (e.g. transcendentals).
Wait, nevermind. I seem to be confused about something, Wikipedia says the transcendentals are uncountable.
In another universe, perhaps they are ...
For the rest of us, Taylor series are the best oculus I can think of into the known transcendentals (Pi, e, sin(a/b), etc.). However, most transcendentals will remain obscure by virtue of being irrelevant.
The rational numbers are infinite, the irrational numbers are infinite, add them together and you have the real numbers, which is a "larger" infinite set than the rational numbers (and probably the irrationals, though I can't say for sure since I've never attempted that proof).
Quite right. There are two types of infinite cardinality: countable and uncountable. Countable encompasses the set of rational numbers, and calculable irrationals such as roots and all polynomial combinations of the those for which there is an isomorphic map onto the set of integers. Then there's the greater set, the uncountably infinite, e.g. the transcendental numbers and their ilk.
I doubt the cardinality of real numbers would be greater than irrationals themselves, since most numbers are transcendental. It'd be like taking a teaspoon of water out of the ocean and wondering if it's still the ocean.
Back to monkeys: One of infinite monkeys or infinite time may be a greater infinite than the other (i.e. uncountable), if only one of time or space maps onto the set of integers. Not that it changes the outcome: Shakespeare's works; but it's a good brain teaser.
that an infinate number of monkeys, working for an infinate amount of time will eventually recreate the works of shakespere
Wouldn't an infinite number of monkeys instantaneously recreate the works of Shakespeare, or one monkey working for an infinite amount of time?
Two infinites does not a greater infinite make.
No, you can't, because copyright isn't property. It's a state-granted theoretically-temporary entitlement of monopoly to a particular set of words, sounds, or images. You're not stealing the property, you're violating the monopoly. That's not the same thing.
You're right that copyright infringement ought not be called 'stealing'. However, challenging the qualification of copyright being 'property' on the basis that it's a state-granted fiction is a red herring. All notions of property are fictions (even in the corporeal sense, if your state endorses torture).
Ones home isn't property, either, by the rationale put forward. It's also a state-granted entitlement of a monopoly ("proprietary interest", if you will) to a particular piece of property. You have no more right to copy music than use your neighbours toilet. Your neighbour might not mind that, and there may be no or nominal loss to the neighbour. But the absence of harm and the indifference of your neighbour doesn't mean you have a right to use his toilet -- your neighbour has an exclusive right to enjoy his property, by virtue of his title (or lease). Much as it is with copyright -- except instead of the exclusive right to enjoyment, it's the right to not have your copyright infringed by e.g. copying without permission. The concept of property is created and enforced by the state (notwithstanding vigilantism, which is generally illegal under the rule of law), whether that property is your home, your car, or your copyrightable works. It is all a legal fiction.
The *morality* of enforcing those different concepts of property is a different story, and calling copyright infringement 'stealing' is at-best misleading, but that's not to say it isn't an enforceable form of proprietary interest (i.e. property).
It's dense and relatively long, but perhaps this well reasoned article will offer some food for thought, or even guidance: "The Right to Privacy", Warren and Brandeis Harvard Law Review. Vol. IV December 15, 1890 No. 5.
To some people, a "liberal" is someone who believes the government should take care of people who have been left behind someway in the economic process, the unemployed, the homeless, those who are at a disadvantage in some way. Under that point of view, Cuba should be considered one of the most "liberal" regimes in the world.
Ironically, the welfare state (which concept I believe subsumes what you've described as what some people call "liberal") was originally a conservative concept, founded on the idea that if people needn't be concerned about risk (e.g. to their health) they will be able to do more work.
I don't have a link to that on the web, but I recall reading that in Niall Ferguson's book the Ascent of Money.
You're right! Good catch. It was around 1998-99, in Fredericton, New Brunswick. I seem to recall NB Tel was at the time a testbed for Nortel and perhaps other telecom equipment makers. I also seem to recall NB Tel was, with Sasktel, the first DSL provider in Canada... but alas I can't remember or find a web-site to verify that.
In any event, it was around ten years ago I had the same speed of internet access that I have now ...
I'm now living in a major urban metropolis and I've got the same crappy DSL internet that I had in rural Canada in 1995. 5mbps. On that basis I conclude that whatever the powers-that-be are doing to stimulate innovation, it's been a failure. Utterly. Sigh.