The Milgram Experiment shows how people will do things under orders that they might otherwise think better of. It might not be a good excuse, but "just taking orders" is a real effect.
Interesting that you mention "Happy Birthday". Copyright protection is the reason restaurant wait-staff crow some other tuneless "song" at you when they bring out the cake with the sparklers, instead of "Happy Birthday To You".
While I agree with your fundamental position - technology in the last 10 years has brought massive challenges to the assumptions underlying the very nature of intellectual property - I find it ironic that you chose this example, since obviously someone still thinks the copyright in HappyBirthday is worth something.
Yeah - just like the DMCA was.. and the Patriot Act.. and..
Re:The Outer Limits, cryonics, Alcor, etc.
on
Download Your Brain
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· Score: 1
As far as I can tell, this process has almost no chance of success. Your contract with Alcor is exactly the same as a religious persons 'contract' with the saviour of their choice. Often this involves giving up some worldly power so that they can be 'ressurrected' in an afterlife of some description (Or a better human incarnation).
You give up the power all that money would have given you in this life for the vain (and I mean vain - the science is sketchy at best) hope that somehow, in the future, some unspecified people will have the technology and the desire to ressurect you into a brand-spanking new world.
Keep your money, enjoy your life, try to live it for as long as possible in as good a condition as possible.
It does happen - but not reliably. There's this thing called "competition", and it's the King. Occaisionally you'll be in competition with someone else who will overpromise (and underdeliver). Often that person won't even be an engineer (marketing and sales people love to promise things to customers).
Suddenly you're looking to meet a deadline you had no part in determining, for features that aren't even computable.
There's a difference between what *is* illegal, and what *ought to be* illegal.
The issue is even larger than whether it occurs on a computer or not. There are people who think any form of copyright protection is an artificial construct which fails to achieve its purported aim of promoting innovation and arts for the betterment of society as a whole. As such, they argue, it should be repealed. At which point, once you've got hold of a physical object in your hot little paws, you're free to copy it, jump up and down on it, burn it, give it away, or shove the DVD of it into the microwave and watch it spark.
Its not the computer alone which has made this such a hotbed of discussion - its the Information Superhighway (who else remembers that outmoded term?).
Without the speedy broadband data rates, copying significant amounts of data required access to a physical representation of the item, and often costly reproductive hardware.
The convergence of technologies makes copyright infringement a trivial act for the average person.
Does that make it legal ? No. Does it make it right ? That's actually still up for debate, whether you understand the issues of the debate or not.
The other guy was asking you why you think something *should* be illegal, and you respond with.. because it's illegal!
Way to go.
The problem is that there is a collision of rights - your right to do with the physical stuff that you own as you see fit, and the right of the copyright holder to restrict it. You haven't shown why you think the right of the copyright holder should prevail, other than "the government says so". To many of us (even those decided on the side of Copyright) that's an insufficent reason.
Company loses $1million, one thief gains $1000. It's not zero sum unless you account for the 999 other thieves. Since the thieves don't usually work together, you can't say that it's zero sum from the perspective of the thief who was caught.
Thief gains $1000, the Company loses $1million (from all the thieves), then the thief loses $1million.
Finally, I don't remember arguing that simple restitution was either just, or adequate, merely that it was more just and more useful than your system. I'm glad you brought up other 'values' like social standing etc. Intangible values weren't accounted for in your system either. Restitution and variations of public shaming have been shown to work in modern societies, mostly on youths where peer standing is extremely important. However, as a blanket solution, it lacks quite a lot. Petty larceny is one thing, but how do you perform restitution for murder ? What kind of public shaming is sufficient a punishment for rape? It simply isn't.
In any case, this conversation has come a long way from your original post. Nice talking with you.
Even in the hypothetical world, it's only a zero-sum game when accounting for all participants. But each thief is an independant actor, and they can't be summed. That's the problem. You can't blame one thief for the actions of all, because they don't act in concert.
I agree with your assessment that, in the real world, surveillance will therefore become profitable thus balancing things out.
I guess I was arguing that, by ignoring the other potential balances within the real world, your solution was unrealistic, and furthermore, unworkable.
I don't think you've proven that restitution is a completely inadequate punishment. In fact, public restitution combined with a certain psychological makeup instilled in many cultures seems to work on more people than mere fining ever would. Consider the other 999 thieves who stole $1000 each. The chance that they will be caught (and must pay $1 million) is fairly small. That's an acceptable operating risk, especially considering that they could simply refuse to pay. If they don't have the money, what happens ? Should they be incarcerated for lack of payment ? Should we incarcerate just anyone who cannot pay their debts ? So why bother with the $1million fine, since no thief can pay it, and just go straight to jail with them.. Bingo, you've got many legal systems right now.
I think that the concept of justice is intricately intertwined with improving society. I certainly see no net benefit, economically or socially to your game theory system. Do you not see the burden caused by such a system? a) Who assesses the economic loss to the company? Upon whom is the burden to prove an overall loss? b) What costs would be involved in proving (beyond a reasonable doubt, or balance of probabilities only?) that a certain loss to the company over a certain period (decade, year, month, week?) was attributed to theft? c) Under what circumstances might certain thefts be excused? A small child shoplifting a candy-bar is liable for the entire damages caused to the company over an undetermined period ? Is that actually just under any system ? d) How much of the fine goes to the company? If none of it, then the company doesn't actually recoup anything for it's loss, which is unfair to it. If all of it (barring a small percentage for court costs etc), then at what point do the fines decrease ? I mean, if they catch one criminal every year and lose $1 million dollars each year, which they recoup from that one guy (say), what happens when they catch two criminals ? Does the second guy pay nothing ? Does he pay another million ? Who gets that million? Does he give half of it to the other thief and half to the company ?
You're still calculating based on company losses rather than the proportion of "gain" by the thieves. This is an unjust solution.
For example: 1000 thieves steal 1 million dollars worth of stuff. Lets say each thief steals 10 times (each item is worth $100). Say your chance of catching a thief was only 1 in a million. What should the fine be ?
One thief is caught after he's performed all 10 of his crimes, but you only caught him performing one theft.
If he pays back what he stole that last time, it's $100. If he pays back what he's stolen altogether it's $1000. If you use your calculation, it's $1,000,000, because all the thieves together stole that much.
Right ?
It's unjust to weigh the fine based on the economic loss to the company, if only because companies aren't lily-white either (losses can be inflated, especially if there's any expected gain due to restitution, etc).
It's also not just to base your punishment on the expected, average behaviour of all thieves, everywhere. The fact that many thieves commit multiple crimes doesn't mean that every thief does, nor should every thief be punished for the actions of all of them. Nor can one simply average the loss amongst all those who were caught. IF you take your calculation to the next level, soon you'll be leveraging the loss to society as a whole vs any criminal.
How can we expect people to take responsibility for their own actions when they will be punished for the actions of others ? Don't forget - it's not a deterrent, because not everyone is a fully rational agent (for whom such a punishment would be a deterrent).
1/ If the chances of being caught are that low, the risk/reward to the shoplifter is still high, no matter how good your maths are, because as we all know "It won't happen to to me" is the mantra of the average person. After all, if the death penalty can't be shown to reduce crime, how will a fine ? - You can always declare bankruptcy, you know. 2/ If Walmart actually recouped the fine itself, then it might make sense for them to impose it. As a deterrent it's pathetic, (see 1) but as an economic balance, it might work. However see 3) 3/ The chances of recouping the fine from most shoplifters would approach nil. What happens when the money they owe you doesn't exist ? We don't have debtors prisons anymore. And simply throwing them in jail won't get you your money back anyway, which means this isn't a suitable economic tool either. Walmarts balance sheet doesn't care about how many shoplifters it put in jail.
Finally, the concept of justice isn't one of economics or mathematics. Let us judge the crime, not the company balance-book.
Actually, as far as I know, being a victim doesn't teach a child that at all. The child learns to associate power and strength with aggression and violence. In order to not be a victim, the child grows up to be the aggressor.
Teaching a child limits requries patience and tolerance as well as a firm hand.
Of course, that's hardly germaine to the discussion.
If this process is occurring, it is a trickle at best. It will not affect global oil production in a measurable fashion.
Care to back that up ? How do you know that this is the case? The idea that oil is biotic in origin has been assumed. The idea that the process which produced it happened in the distant past, based on the decay of biological organisms and cannot, therefore, be renewable was proposed and never seriously challenged in the west.
To say therefore that the oil was made once and will 'run out' is also an assumption. Most petrochemists deny an abiotic origin for oil, despite the fact that it's been shown to be possible. If some then admit, later, that it might be a small component of oil production, how can one trust their judgement (or bias) when assessing the rate of renewal of abiotic oil ?
I will certainly concede that the problem is one of consumption overtaking production. Even if oil is being produced deep in the crust, we have no idea how quickly, or whether the process is continual, or spasmodic. To say that it's a trickle at best is as ill-informed as saying it never happens, or that we have nothing to worry about. But the Peak Oil enthusiasts tend to shout doom and gloom, end o'the world stuff. They foretold the death of the world in the last 70's and it didn't happen then.
Ahh - Peak Oil again. Didn't we peak in the 70's ? What about the evidence that suggests that oil may be produced abiotically at deep pressures from common elements found in the crust ? What about the fact that all our oil numbers come from people in the oil industry - who have a vested interest in keeping their prices at a premium?
I recently discovered that the theory that oil came from decaying biological organisms in the deep past was a notion proposed in the late 1800s and never actually challenged by most western petrochemists ever since.
Imagine if they are wrong ?
Of course, using all that energy might not be environmentally consiencious, but that's a different story.
Hmm. Interesting. The problem I have is that I don't know what "foundational" means here.
To me, that sounds just like "presumptive". (No offense intended, BTW).
By saying "fundamentals rights are the minimum set of rights necessary for a free, rational agent to name them." it's presuming that free and rational are fundamental rights in themselves.
Circular logic is where you assume something you're trying to prove. To claim that discussions about rights that are not so based is "uninteresting" is just dodging the question.
It doesn't matter if we're not free.. well not to the question it doesn't. While it certainly matters for us to be free and rational to discuss and formulate this question, it shouldn't be necessary for the question to be answered, that we exist as rational and free. At least, unless your argument is actually that there are no such things as fundamental rights outside of the existance of rational free beings. Therefore the existance of a society of such creatures is the only reason for their existance.. they don't come from 'outside'.
The question as I see it is "How does one define fundamental rights?" To say that such rights are definable as the minimum necessary for someone who is X and Y to exist who can so define them just leads to the question "How do you arrive at the necessity for X and Y attributes?" By stating that these are inherently necessary by fiat is simply to ascribe them a fundamental nature of their own through intuition. "It's turtles all the way down."
Again - I expect I'm missing something (ahem) fundamental to your argument.
Oh - and yes, there's not usually a lot of cogent discussion on Slashdot, but I've been lucky enough to get my feet wet occaisionally, here.
Do you disagree then that the argument is circular ?
By assuming that one must be free and rational to define rights, one presumes that those are therefore part of the rights to be defined, or it all falls down.
To me, it's logically ineffective unless one can demonstrate why one should believe a) those two attributes are actually necessary to formulate a list of rights b) if this argument is correct, there's no circularity in the logic - for example one could be free and rational and define a fundamental set of rights which do not include freedom or rationality. Or something like that:)
Slashdot Mirror
The Milgram Experiment shows how people will do things under orders that they might otherwise think better of.
It might not be a good excuse, but "just taking orders" is a real effect.
Interesting that you mention "Happy Birthday". Copyright protection is the reason restaurant wait-staff crow some other tuneless "song" at you when they bring out the cake with the sparklers, instead of "Happy Birthday To You".
c.f http://www.snopes.com/music/songs/birthday.asp
While I agree with your fundamental position - technology in the last 10 years has brought massive challenges to the assumptions underlying the very nature of intellectual property - I find it ironic that you chose this example, since obviously someone still thinks the copyright in HappyBirthday is worth something.
Yeah - just like the DMCA was.. and the Patriot Act .. and ..
As far as I can tell, this process has almost no chance of success. Your contract with Alcor is exactly the same as a religious persons 'contract' with the saviour of their choice.
Often this involves giving up some worldly power so that they can be 'ressurrected' in an afterlife of some description (Or a better human incarnation).
You give up the power all that money would have given you in this life for the vain (and I mean vain - the science is sketchy at best) hope that somehow, in the future, some unspecified people will have the technology and the desire to ressurect you into a brand-spanking new world.
Keep your money, enjoy your life, try to live it for as long as possible in as good a condition as possible.
Ambidextrous doesn't help me - I need both hands at the same time.
It does happen - but not reliably. There's this thing called "competition", and it's the King.
Occaisionally you'll be in competition with someone else who will overpromise (and underdeliver). Often that person won't even be an engineer (marketing and sales people love to promise things to customers).
Suddenly you're looking to meet a deadline you had no part in determining, for features that aren't even computable.
Time for Monster.com...
There's a difference between what *is* illegal, and what *ought to be* illegal.
The issue is even larger than whether it occurs on a computer or not. There are people who think any form of copyright protection is an artificial construct which fails to achieve its purported aim of promoting innovation and arts for the betterment of society as a whole. As such, they argue, it should be repealed. At which point, once you've got hold of a physical object in your hot little paws, you're free to copy it, jump up and down on it, burn it, give it away, or shove the DVD of it into the microwave and watch it spark.
Its not the computer alone which has made this such a hotbed of discussion - its the Information Superhighway (who else remembers that outmoded term?).
Without the speedy broadband data rates, copying significant amounts of data required access to a physical representation of the item, and often costly reproductive hardware.
The convergence of technologies makes copyright infringement a trivial act for the average person.
Does that make it legal ? No.
Does it make it right ? That's actually still up for debate, whether you understand the issues of the debate or not.
It should be illegal because it breaks the law ?
.. because it's illegal!
The other guy was asking you why you think something *should* be illegal, and you respond with
Way to go.
The problem is that there is a collision of rights - your right to do with the physical stuff that you own as you see fit, and the right of the copyright holder to restrict it. You haven't shown why you think the right of the copyright holder should prevail, other than "the government says so".
To many of us (even those decided on the side of Copyright) that's an insufficent reason.
Well - he is playing Luke's dad, right ?
I mean, if whining could conceivably be genetic, I think you've got your evidence, right there.
Actually the dialog *was* 'shit blowing up'.
To illustrate my zero-sum argument
Company loses $1million, one thief gains $1000. It's not zero sum unless you account for the 999 other thieves. Since the thieves don't usually work together, you can't say that it's zero sum from the perspective of the thief who was caught.
Thief gains $1000, the Company loses $1million (from all the thieves), then the thief loses $1million.
Finally, I don't remember arguing that simple restitution was either just, or adequate, merely that it was more just and more useful than your system.
I'm glad you brought up other 'values' like social standing etc. Intangible values weren't accounted for in your system either. Restitution and variations of public shaming have been shown to work in modern societies, mostly on youths where peer standing is extremely important. However, as a blanket solution, it lacks quite a lot. Petty larceny is one thing, but how do you perform restitution for murder ? What kind of public shaming is sufficient a punishment for rape? It simply isn't.
In any case, this conversation has come a long way from your original post. Nice talking with you.
No, you've got it all wrong. The dark moves out of the way so fast, the light didn't even see it leaving
Interesting.
Even in the hypothetical world, it's only a zero-sum game when accounting for all participants. But each thief is an independant actor, and they can't be summed. That's the problem. You can't blame one thief for the actions of all, because they don't act in concert.
I agree with your assessment that, in the real world, surveillance will therefore become profitable thus balancing things out.
I guess I was arguing that, by ignoring the other potential balances within the real world, your solution was unrealistic, and furthermore, unworkable.
I don't think you've proven that restitution is a completely inadequate punishment. In fact, public restitution combined with a certain psychological makeup instilled in many cultures seems to work on more people than mere fining ever would. Consider the other 999 thieves who stole $1000 each. The chance that they will be caught (and must pay $1 million) is fairly small. That's an acceptable operating risk, especially considering that they could simply refuse to pay. If they don't have the money, what happens ? Should they be incarcerated for lack of payment ? Should we incarcerate just anyone who cannot pay their debts ? So why bother with the $1million fine, since no thief can pay it, and just go straight to jail with them.. Bingo, you've got many legal systems right now.
I think that the concept of justice is intricately intertwined with improving society. I certainly see no net benefit, economically or socially to your game theory system. Do you not see the burden caused by such a system?
a) Who assesses the economic loss to the company? Upon whom is the burden to prove an overall loss? b) What costs would be involved in proving (beyond a reasonable doubt, or balance of probabilities only?) that a certain loss to the company over a certain period (decade, year, month, week?) was attributed to theft?
c) Under what circumstances might certain thefts be excused? A small child shoplifting a candy-bar is liable for the entire damages caused to the company over an undetermined period ? Is that actually just under any system ?
d) How much of the fine goes to the company? If none of it, then the company doesn't actually recoup anything for it's loss, which is unfair to it. If all of it (barring a small percentage for court costs etc), then at what point do the fines decrease ? I mean, if they catch one criminal every year and lose $1 million dollars each year, which they recoup from that one guy (say), what happens when they catch two criminals ? Does the second guy pay nothing ? Does he pay another million ? Who gets that million? Does he give half of it to the other thief and half to the company ?
You're still calculating based on company losses rather than the proportion of "gain" by the thieves. This is an unjust solution.
For example
1000 thieves steal 1 million dollars worth of stuff. Lets say each thief steals 10 times (each item is worth $100). Say your chance of catching a thief was only 1 in a million. What should the fine be ?
One thief is caught after he's performed all 10 of his crimes, but you only caught him performing one theft.
If he pays back what he stole that last time, it's $100.
If he pays back what he's stolen altogether it's $1000.
If you use your calculation, it's $1,000,000, because all the thieves together stole that much.
Right ?
It's unjust to weigh the fine based on the economic loss to the company, if only because companies aren't lily-white either (losses can be inflated, especially if there's any expected gain due to restitution, etc).
It's also not just to base your punishment on the expected, average behaviour of all thieves, everywhere. The fact that many thieves commit multiple crimes doesn't mean that every thief does, nor should every thief be punished for the actions of all of them. Nor can one simply average the loss amongst all those who were caught. IF you take your calculation to the next level, soon you'll be leveraging the loss to society as a whole vs any criminal.
How can we expect people to take responsibility for their own actions when they will be punished for the actions of others ? Don't forget - it's not a deterrent, because not everyone is a fully rational agent (for whom such a punishment would be a deterrent).
Which only works in a perfectly rational world.
1/ If the chances of being caught are that low, the risk/reward to the shoplifter is still high, no matter how good your maths are, because as we all know "It won't happen to to me" is the mantra of the average person. After all, if the death penalty can't be shown to reduce crime, how will a fine ? - You can always declare bankruptcy, you know.
2/ If Walmart actually recouped the fine itself, then it might make sense for them to impose it. As a deterrent it's pathetic, (see 1) but as an economic balance, it might work. However see 3)
3/ The chances of recouping the fine from most shoplifters would approach nil. What happens when the money they owe you doesn't exist ? We don't have debtors prisons anymore. And simply throwing them in jail won't get you your money back anyway, which means this isn't a suitable economic tool either. Walmarts balance sheet doesn't care about how many shoplifters it put in jail.
Finally, the concept of justice isn't one of economics or mathematics. Let us judge the crime, not the company balance-book.
Actually, as far as I know, being a victim doesn't teach a child that at all. The child learns to associate power and strength with aggression and violence. In order to not be a victim, the child grows up to be the aggressor.
Teaching a child limits requries patience and tolerance as well as a firm hand.
Of course, that's hardly germaine to the discussion.
If this process is occurring, it is a trickle at best. It will not affect global oil production in a measurable fashion.
Care to back that up ? How do you know that this is the case? The idea that oil is biotic in origin has been assumed. The idea that the process which produced it happened in the distant past, based on the decay of biological organisms and cannot, therefore, be renewable was proposed and never seriously challenged in the west.
To say therefore that the oil was made once and will 'run out' is also an assumption. Most petrochemists deny an abiotic origin for oil, despite the fact that it's been shown to be possible. If some then admit, later, that it might be a small component of oil production, how can one trust their judgement (or bias) when assessing the rate of renewal of abiotic oil ?
I will certainly concede that the problem is one of consumption overtaking production. Even if oil is being produced deep in the crust, we have no idea how quickly, or whether the process is continual, or spasmodic. To say that it's a trickle at best is as ill-informed as saying it never happens, or that we have nothing to worry about.
But the Peak Oil enthusiasts tend to shout doom and gloom, end o'the world stuff. They foretold the death of the world in the last 70's and it didn't happen then.
Got any more Wolves ?
Ahh - Peak Oil again.
Didn't we peak in the 70's ?
What about the evidence that suggests that oil may be produced abiotically at deep pressures from common elements found in the crust ?
What about the fact that all our oil numbers come from people in the oil industry - who have a vested interest in keeping their prices at a premium?
I recently discovered that the theory that oil came from decaying biological organisms in the deep past was a notion proposed in the late 1800s and never actually challenged by most western petrochemists ever since.
Imagine if they are wrong ?
Of course, using all that energy might not be environmentally consiencious, but that's a different story.
They do intervene - in FAVOR of the stupid things.
You do know that the government subsidises SUVs by giving the motor companies a tax break to make them?
The problem is that this solution just moves the costs around.
The panels are produced in factories - which have an environmental impact you're not considering.
Have they given up predicting this one yet ?
You *were* joking right ? .. right ?
I mean....
Simple. ... out ..
You just cut
Damn!
[gluoommph] -- sound of foot being extracted from mouth
Hmm. Interesting.
The problem I have is that I don't know what "foundational" means here.
To me, that sounds just like "presumptive". (No offense intended, BTW).
By saying "fundamentals rights are the minimum set of rights necessary for a free, rational agent to name them." it's presuming that free and rational are fundamental rights in themselves.
Circular logic is where you assume something you're trying to prove. To claim that discussions about rights that are not so based is "uninteresting" is just dodging the question.
It doesn't matter if we're not free.. well not to the question it doesn't. While it certainly matters for us to be free and rational to discuss and formulate this question, it shouldn't be necessary for the question to be answered, that we exist as rational and free. At least, unless your argument is actually that there are no such things as fundamental rights outside of the existance of rational free beings. Therefore the existance of a society of such creatures is the only reason for their existance.. they don't come from 'outside'.
The question as I see it is "How does one define fundamental rights?"
To say that such rights are definable as the minimum necessary for someone who is X and Y to exist who can so define them just leads to the question "How do you arrive at the necessity for X and Y attributes?"
By stating that these are inherently necessary by fiat is simply to ascribe them a fundamental nature of their own through intuition. "It's turtles all the way down."
Again - I expect I'm missing something (ahem) fundamental to your argument.
Oh - and yes, there's not usually a lot of cogent discussion on Slashdot, but I've been lucky enough to get my feet wet occaisionally, here.
Do you disagree then that the argument is circular ?
:)
By assuming that one must be free and rational to define rights, one presumes that those are therefore part of the rights to be defined, or it all falls down.
To me, it's logically ineffective unless one can demonstrate why one should believe
a) those two attributes are actually necessary to formulate a list of rights
b) if this argument is correct, there's no circularity in the logic - for example one could be free and rational and define a fundamental set of rights which do not include freedom or rationality.
Or something like that