Lewis McCarthy scripsit [...]
Choosing the place to draw the line is indeed the crux of the matter IMHO. I try to draw it at the point where one person's misuse of technology starts to hurt another person (which often begs the question, I know !).
We're basically on the same wavelength after all.
Considering some of your examples: [...]
OTOH I can see that ABS could stop a lot of slow/non-alert people from slamming their cars into me & mine; I trust the technology more than the people who would be replacing it. I'm happy that it's a fairly standard feature, although this seems to be more a result of market demand than regulation.
My point (poorly expressed) was that making these mandatory would annoy me. I'm actually pleased with ABS as a market function.
Your mention of outlawing sugar calls to mind some debates about smoking bans. Here IMHO the line is clear. When you eat sugar next to me, you're not doing me any harm unless I'm forced to pay your dental bills. In sharp contrast, I consider smoking in company to be assault with a deadly weapon. My choice of self-defense in this case is legislation preventing anyone from smoking in my airspace. I have no problem with people smoking in private where the smoke's never going to harm me.
You make the massive leap in logic here that eludes the legislators. It's the impact on others in the SPECIFIC and not the aggregate that should be used to determine limitations on technology. I tend to preach absolutism in deregulation (or near to it) because allowing distinction threatens to put legislators in the position of deciding where the line is. You think I want to be forced to buy an ABS car because the average driver is an idiot and because Driving School is a joke? Of course not. I refuse to be bound by the national average.
Of course, the explosive success of bullshit litigation (strongly aided IMHO by our lowest-common-denominator jury selection system) has played a major role in inducing companies & the govt. to go overboard protecting people from their own idiocy. I just want to be protected from other people's idiocy :)
I don't see the connection here. How does the jury system contribute to government intervention? Whatever the jury verdict in a civil suit, the government still has to say "We can't allow all these law suits, let's ban X so there wont be any more." You can have 40 billion in judgements against KY jelly, that doesn't mean government needs to be involved. The judgements, the publicity, and the civil system have SOLVED the problem. Those who might have had problems with KY have been compensated, those who are smart consumers will avoid KY, and KY will either go out of business, make massive efforts to correct the problem and get the information out there that that problem has been corrected, or it can afford the suits. I'd prefer to see a consumer monitoring program, listing complaints, lawsuits and quality ratings on products available via net/1-800 number and etc. A "good housekeeping" rating of A to F for example. If this information system is handled properly and given enough detail and depth there are no such problems. The market will regulate and the incentives will be to provide the best product, at the lowest cost. Information is the key, and if the consumer cannot bother him or herself to check out the product they buy I'm not sympathetic. Of course one cypherpunk is sure to say: "Nice, but not about cryptography." Part of the problem with cryptography and technology today is that consumers have little if any information about the field. What a shame it would be if the market were killed by government "we know what's best for you before you've even seen it" before it ever got big.
I won't touch on the question of required backdoor installation....
-L. McCarthy Send me mail using "Subject: remailer-help" for an autoreply about Underdog
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