Laws of mathematics, not of men

[Tim May]

At 9:18 AM -0700 8/1/01, jamesd at echeque.com wrote:
>      --
>On 31 Jul 2001, at 11:53, Black Unicorn wrote:
>>  I wanted to make sure to correct the common misconception among
>>  cypherpunks that you can just thumb your nose at a court with
>>  impunity.
>
>And I would like to correct the common misconception spread by 
>lawyers that there are magic legal formulas that will stop the state 
>from using its power as it damn well pleases.
>
>The basic formula for avoiding inconvenient legislation is "ignore, 
>do not confront"
>
>Cryptography will do what no legal incantation can ever do:  Stop 
>the state from getting what it wants.
>
>The basic problem with any legal incantation is that at some point 
>you must explain to the authorities:  "My actions were legal for 
>this reason and that reason", explaining in inconveniently great 
>detail what you are doing, and their response your complicated and 
>highly informative explanation
>will almost certainly be to hit a few times, and then lock you up. 
>With cryptography they have a mysterious block of unexplained and 
>useless bits.


Exactly so. This list, like so many other lists, is gradually moving 
toward "public politics" and "the law" as the focus of many members.

The "public politics" part is obvious: discussions of boycotts of 
Adobe, letter-writing campaigns to Washington, complaining about 
Ashcroft and Feinstein and all of the other vermin, and hand-wringing 
about the need for different laws.

The "law" part is about the above, and exhortations by the lawyers 
here (5, by my count) about what one mustn't do, how courts will 
react, the need to be scrupulously legal in all of one's actions, etc.

"Laws of mathematics, not men."

We risk becoming just a pale--a very, very pale!--imitation of the 
Cyberia-L list.


--Tim May





-- 
Timothy C. May         tcmay at got.net        Corralitos, California
Political: Co-founder Cypherpunks/crypto anarchy/Cyphernomicon
Technical: physics/soft errors/Smalltalk/Squeak/agents/games/Go
Personal: b.1951/UCSB/Intel '74-'86/retired/investor/motorcycles/guns