From: Dan Fabulich (daniel.fabulich@yale.edu)
Date: Wed Mar 29 2000 - 12:13:10 MST
'What is your name?' 'Zero Powers.' 'Do you deny having written the
following?':
> >This is certainly as it should be, as it's hard to imagine these
> >organizations doing their jobs effectively without this sort of secrecy.
>
> Believe it or not I'm not stupid enough to believe that power proportional
> transparency is now in place to any significant extent. I was merely
> replying to Mike Lorrey who suggested that a system which allowed the little
> guy to know more about the leaders than the leaders knew about the little
> guy would lead to the leaders being assasinated forthwith. I was just
> pointing out that that is not necessarily the case.
Nonetheless, the secrecy of our top levels of organization is certainly as
it should be, as it's hard to imagine these organizaitons doing their jobs
effectively without this sort of secrecy. This may not have been the
point to which you were replying, but it's right anyway. ;)
> >So ubiquitous surveilance promotes despotism; since despotism is nasty, to
> >the extent that we can prevent ubiquitous surveilance, we should.
>
> Again, you must have come into the thread late. You seem to completely
> misunderstand (a) what I am proposing and (b) why I think it would be a good
> idea. I am not necessarily proposing omniscience for the masses. I
> advocate "transparency." There is a difference. In particular I advocate
> power proportional transparency which means that the more power you have to
> effect the lives of others the more exposed you must be. Such that if you
> are the designated leader of the free world, you will live under a virtual
> microscope with nearly everything about you being recorded and available for
> perusal by those whose lives you have the power to effect.
>
> I also propose that the transparency be mutual and two-way, such that
> anytime I access any information about you, you can automatically be
> notified of (a) what information I got about you, (b) when I got it, (c) how
> I got it, (d) who I am, and (e) whatever information I got about you, you
> could be given about me. For instance say I looked up Dan Fabulich's home
> address and telephone number. You would be notified that I did that and you
> would, if you wanted, be notified of my home address and telephone number.
> You could also be notified of where, when and how I make use of your
> information.
If the top levels of government are under extreme scrutiny, yet to be
scrutinize someone about X, you have to reveal X to the scrutinized, how
is it NOT the case that both the top levels of government and the little
guy are under extreme scrutiny? Whoever is fully scrutinizing Clinton is
fully scrutinized by Clinton. It seems that even if your system works
flawlessly, the result is simple total surveilance a la Brin, where the
cameras are everywhere and anyone who wants to can look at any camera at
any time to find out what you're up to right now.
How could you guarantee that whatever I learn about you, you learn about
me? If the information is already organized into facts (telephone
numbers, addresses, etc.) it's easy to see, but when the question is of
the form "are they having sex right now?" it's hard to imagine how a
simple system could reveal that to you and reveal that to the targetted
party in any useful way, or even answer the question without at least
human level intelligence. The problem gets compounded when I start asking
"with whom are they having sex right now? How? Are they doing so in the
approved way?" In general, the whole point of surveilance is to detect
wrongdoing. I want to ask "are they commiting a wrongdoing?" How would a
simple system know that? How could a simple system reveal that to others?
Finally, what's stopping the government from using the cameras all the
time, with your full knowledge? Sure, you'd get lots of information about
the despot at the head of government, but, it doesn't *matter* how much
information you get about the despot; indeed, more information only makes
the despot's threats more plausible. You both know he's a despot making
unreasonable demands and that he could squash you like a bug if he felt
like it. How has transparency helped you?
-Dan
-unless you love someone-
-nothing else makes any sense-
e.e. cummings
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