From: Mike Lorrey (mlorrey@datamann.com)
Date: Fri Jun 22 2001 - 08:11:49 MDT
Spike Jones wrote:
>
> Mike Lorrey wrote:
>
> > Spike: The CD you gave me happened to be missing the disk, it was an
> > empty case.... boo-boo. Do you happen to have one with an actual disk
> > inside? BTW the room was great, your house is very cool, hope we can do
> > this again....
>
> Doh! Greg and I were looking at that disk and I thought we had put it
> back into the case but it is in Shelly's machine. Offlist me your home
> snail
> mail @.
>
> Glad you could stay over, Mike. I had a great time. First time Ive ever
> been up past midnight 6 nights in a row. And happy about it. {8^D
>
> Regarding our privacy debate, it was great to talk that over face to
> face. I now realize I don't think we ever really disagreed, just came
> with differing initial assumptions. If I understand correctly, you want
> a society where trust is necessary, as in trust is a good thing, that
> improves society. Trust the persons you deal with, for they *might*
> have a weapon, etc. Trust but verify is not trusting, etc.
>
> In a small town environment, I agree this notion has merit. In a
> place like this, it is impractical to trust, since you cannot know the
> reputations of the persons with which one must deal every day.
Spike, big cities are not a new thing, they have been around for
thousands of years prior to the invention of the credit agency.
Landlords have been renting, public utilities have been operating, and
horse traders, general stores, and outfitters have been financing
purchases for thousands of years as well.
> For instance, if one were to go to the local hardware store on
> the first day of the month for three solid years, I speculate that
> one would not get the same checkout person twice in that entire
> 36 visits. Likewise with many of the occasionally-visited stores.
> Around here, anyone who has a McJob needs to be finding a
> real job very quickly, for the mortgage man cometh. So the
> service jobs tend to be revolving doors, as it is with many of
> the other aspects of life. Reputations cannot be a practical
> means of doing business.
Credit agencies started out as reputation clearinghouses. Originally
banks would grant loans to new individuals (for example settling in
western US territories) based on letters of reference, sometimes from
people hundreds or thousands of miles away, back when mail really was
expensive. As banks grew and consolidated, they consolidated these
letter records and the banking records. Credit agencies as we know them
today are the result of the widespread bank failures of the 1930's. A
few corporations started buying up the banking records of individuals at
the bankruptcy auctions of the banks that failed, totally irrespective
of the privacy rights of the account holders, who often had left the
area to find work elsewhere. I consider this phenomenon, and the fact
that the federal government did nothing to stop it, an artifact of
Roosevelt's New Deal and the generally socialist attitude of the day
that accepted that the day of individual rights had ended with the
'capitulation' of the capitalist system in 1929. Just like the NFA
passed a few years later in 1934, this is another example of how the
Democrats sold out the Bill of Rights in order to get reelected.
>
> I hope to explore the ideas further that you and I discussed,
> and would like if you would expound on your quasi-debate
> with Dr. Brin {or whatever that encounter should be called.}
I don't know if it got to the point of a debate. I barely got a few
words out before he started on a rant about how I have nothing but
contempt for my fellow human beings and their rights and I'm just like
other extropians in that regard, blah blah blah, and then he bailed
claiming another engagement elsewhere....
I beleive it started with my stating my admiration for his SF work, but
that I disagreed with him on his whole privacy attitude. I got out just
one reason, that the unequal distribution of force between individuals
and governments/corporations meant that they were far more capable of
getting away with violating an individual's rights than the reverse,
especially in cases of individuals with unpopular ideas or
characteristics, when he launched on his tirade, condemning me for not
trusting my fellow man to come to my aid, that humanity had learned from
the holocaust that we must stand up for each other, and he didn't let me
get a word in edgewise after that. If I had, I'd have mentioned just a
few words: Ruby Ridge, Waco, Steve Jackson, The Gun Control Act of
1968.......
Just as Generals always prepare for the last war and not the next war,
people are always most protective of the last persecuted group, not the
next or the current persecuted group (for if they did, those groups
would not be getting persecuted currently....). As a gun owner I am
highly aware of this phenomenon, and Mr. Brin apparently is not.
>
> By the way, it is Eshaun who should be thanked for the beer,
> for he way overdid himself with his generosity. I *still* have
> plenty left over, even after the Mikes devoured a generous
> share. {8^D spike
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