From: Eugen Leitl (eugen@leitl.org)
Date: Fri Oct 25 2002 - 11:04:27 MDT
On Fri, 25 Oct 2002, Robert J. Bradbury wrote:
> I would prefer to focus on the significant events. I think the
> situation in Russia currently qualifies in that respect.
I think we should focus more on trends than singe events. The current
event is not specifically oversignificant for that specific location and
time, it's just less than order of magnitude bigger (I've got used to
Chechen bombings while being in Moscow; the current bodycount of victims
is what? 300? Otoh while I was looking for a place to do PhD I
specifically rejected Israel for climate and personal safety reasons).
Qualitative changes (such as use of weapons of mass destruction by
whoever) are clearly discussable on their own.
> While the debate of ongoing and seemingly irresolvable conflicts seems
> pointless (the Israeli-Palestinian situation comes to mind), the
This conflict is luckily localized. It poses no hazards to those not
having ties to that area. Ties to that area are clearly a liability, and
something which should be minimized. This involves both political and
economical ties. We've wasted three decades not developing alternatives to
fossil energy at a high priority. Luckily, we are at the threshold where
the natural course of events will cause a slow change. Perhaps this is the
time to use federal funding to boost such research, and offer tax
incitements to promote its use.
> debate of a resolvable conflict seems worthy of discussion. The
> resolution in this situation could range from deporting all
> Chechnyans, as Stalin did, to simply freeing Chechnya from Russia.
It is pretty useless discussing this conflict on this list, because the
bulk of participants do not know the history of the conflict, and have no
personal stake in the matter (or so I hope). Our opinions are thus rather
worthless, frankly.
> There isn't better communications here. That has existed for decades.
> What is here seems to be an increasing core concept that it is
> reasonable to sacrifice ones life for a concept. Even if the Russians
Of course, terrorism works. People are notoriously lousy at risk
assessment.
> pull out of Chechnya -- do you think they will let the terrorists go
> free/unpunished? That doesn't fit the Russian mindset IMO. The
> terrorists have already killed at least one person.
Shouldn't we rather look at the trend, which seems to be emergence of a
new axis of conflict between very different adversaries, which impact it
has on us personally, and how this might impact the trend in technology
development?
> If anything the coordination advantages seem to be on the side of
> those enforcing the law. What seems to be taking place on the
> terrorist side is an increasing willingness to sacrifice oneself.
This is not new. What is interesting how this will influence our rights,
and the degree of surveillance this is going to result in. I am personally
not interested in living in a dystopic version of Brinworld just because a
few people show an increasing willingness to sacrifice themselves, while
still sticking to low-tech means.
> Yes, but the same transparency and monitoring that can defeat
> terrorist organizations seem likely to defeat organizations that would
> (legitimately) seek to overthrow an oppressive regime.
Exactly. This is the core issue. Blood and shredded meat gets all the
press while the real issues lie elsewhere.
> It would seem that to preserve our safety and security we may
> have to give up our ability to overthrow a government that has
> "cooked the books" so to speak. [In the U.S. the memories of
> the Nixon era have not completely faded.]
This would seem to be an error in judgement. Right now the personal risk
is negligible, and could be further considerably reduced by changing the
behaviour of people while minimizing the usual security snake oil approach
that applies to the voters and selects for blind activism (if not a hidden
agenda, as there's large personal profits to be made in the turmoil).
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