Edit: Judging from the responses, "blind to" may have been overly charitable.
I see this exact argument -- almost word-for-word -- applied to guns.
I don't presume to know anything about you personally, nor about your political opinions, but I've encountered many west-coast, left-leaning, tech-industry professionals support $TECH on the basis of individual responsibility, whilst simultaneously opposing guns due to their potential for misuse.
What this tells me is that the "X isn't good or bad, it just depends on who's using it" argument is weak. It's weak in the sense that it doesn't capture the nuances that might make someone support bitcoin, but not guns.
(Again, I don't presume to know your thoughts on gun-ownership. I'm making a more general point.)
RATs, malware, spam, ransomware, scareware, worms, all this existed in the largest scale possible before the advent of crypto currency.
Doxing, messing with people, leaking sensitive files, pictures and other media, has existed on massive scale before crypto currencies.
It's the scale of the internet itself, and the amount of money involved, and the fragility of connected systems, that has lead to the increase.
I'll grant that cryptocurrency adds even more of this badness. It's definitively increased the number of bad actors. But this is not the driving cause.
Their 'obvious role' is only a role for some actors. Not everyone is financially motivated.
It's also easily measurable, the revenue of a ransomware-as-a-service group (this exists) is an easy jaw-dropping number to display.
But that number does not capture the damage done by actors not financially motivated. Hell _the_ largest and _most_ devastating attack ever was not financially motivated at all. I'm of course talking about NotPetya. Whose damage and impact easily dwarfs that of the financially motivated ransomware groups.
What I'm getting at (albeit awkwardly), is that I wish your argument included some notion of threshold. At what point do you consider the potential for misuse to be so extreme that the technology should be banned? If you don't address this point, you sound unreasonable to many.
Banning things doesn't stop criminals from using them. It doesn't even stop many otherwise law-abiding people. Many of the people who support banning guns are able to recognize that banning drugs doesn't stop people from using drugs and banning abortions doesn't stop people from getting abortions, so why should banning guns stop shootings?
If you want to stop people from doing something, you need to figure out why they're doing it and remove the reason that causes them to do it. The existence of guns doesn't cause people to shoot up schools. Likewise the existence of Bitcoin doesn't cause people to blackmail. If it's not the cause, then removing it can't remove the effect.
You’re confusing “root cause” with “causal”. Guns do “cause” murder insofar as they facilitate the act of killing. The same argument can be made for Bitcoin facilitating blackmail.
Whether or not banning either technology is a worthwhile trade off is debatable, but an effectively enforced ban is unambiguously effective.
Just about any object can facilitate the act of killing. A car, a bowling ball, a swimming pool. Do these things cause murders too? That's not how causation works.
A car can facilitate going to the store. Does the car cause you to go to the store? Of course not. You go to buy the thing you needed. The car is just a means.
Simply put: an effective crackdown on guns, cars, snowballs, scissors, and Bitcoin can absolutely reduce the associated downsides. The question isn’t “is it effective”. The question is “is it worth it”.
If your basement is flooding from a burst pipe, maybe you can "reduce the associated downsides" by bailing it out. This doesn't fix the problem though, does it? You're actually prolonging and exacerbating the issue by not turning off the water from the source.
Temporary band-aids that address the symptom rather than the disease are not effective in the long run. They also often come with secondary effects and unintended consequences that create additional problems.
I suppose you're also against NPT? Or do nukes gain sentience in your world?
Governments voluntarily agreeing to reduce their weapons is also the same as forcibly forbidding people from using a useful technology. Top notch analysis.
> Governments voluntarily agreeing to reduce their weapons is also the same as forcibly forbidding people from using a useful technology. Top notch analysis.
Governments "forcibly forbid" their citizens from developing nuclear weapons. Similarly so for things far less dangerous than nukes because, you know, "less dangerous than a nuke" isn't exactly synonymous with "safe". I can't top your "top-notch analysis" though, so this will be my last reply.
Cars can be used to run people over, better forbid those. A hammer can cave someone's head in, better forbid that. People can drown in water, better forbid that too. After all, we wouldn't want to be inconsistent.
It's not like we would ever consider using any kind of judgement and conclude that the benefits outweigh the risks for some things. That's just silly.
We simply need data to be as well protected as the criminals can protect their financial transactions.
Sure there is, make Bitcoin illegal. (Edit: Okay, I obviously meant cryptocurrencies, not just Bitcoin...)
> and we'd still want it anyway.
"We" might not span as many people as you'd hope.
By the way there's dozens of other cryptocurrencies now. EDIT: just did a check, apparently there's thousands...
Considering the billions(?) of dollars of damage that it has inflicted so far and the sheer number of lives it has ruined in the process... and the fact that probably >99.99% of people in the world would not attribute their "liberty" to anything related to Bitcoin... and that neither the regulation of money nor "liberty" were invented in 2009... yeah, it very much is...
Bitcoin absolutely has legitimate uses, as I'm sure you know, but that's not really pertinent to the issue that the government doesn't get to tell free men what they may or may not do because someone else committed a crime. "Freedom creates opportunities for bad guys" is not an argument against freedom.
What world you live in?! In the one I know, the government absolutely does tell and has told people what they may or may not do with all sorts of things, including with financial instruments.
> You're arguing that it harms too many people, but I really don't care; it could have harmed ten thousand times the number of people and that wouldn't matter.
Wow!
Generally people at least pretend to care about other people and get a little concerned when it looks like their ideologies might burn the world to the ground, but I suppose it's quite... admirable(?) that you're absolutely brutally honest that you don't care about others...
Projects like bitcoin are not a negative thing for regular citizens, the benefits outweighs the cons. You proposed earlier to make it illegal however, which means you're not okay with some persons having the option to control their currency in the digital space. Such opinions are the reason why bitcoin appeared in the first place, and why cryptography will probably be for a long time a beneficial tool to protect people, along with governments.
I didn't say I don't care about others. I do value liberty higher than life, however. I don't think a cryptocurrency will "burn the world to the ground"...
Governments are allowed to stop people from harming each other - enforce pollution controls, chase down criminals, etc. They aren't allowed to tell someone he can't use bitcoin because too many bad guys use it too.
Doesn't the ledger (blockchain) keep track?
For more serious observers:
Bitcoin is "pseudoanonymous", right? Am I wrong in assuming that state level actors would have the juice to deanon transactions? Like we suspect NSA and others have hacked tor?
Naive me guesses bad guys launder bitcoin thru banks beyond the reach of interpol and other agencies. That seems like a thin, easily pierced veil by any sufficiently motivated state level player.
I've watched some videos about money laundering for noob audiences like me. Based on some of the strategies explained, another notion occurs to me: use a herd of smurfs to launder the bitcoin into physical assets.
When asked during an interview for CNBC's recent "Inside the Mind of Google" special about whether users should be sharing information with Google as if it were a "trusted friend," Schmidt responded, "If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place."
What, no? maybe you should not have an email and credit cards then in the first place? Or what did you actually mean with your statement?
But seriously though, I've held a grudge against Eric ever since he uttered this completely absurd quote. He never backed away from it, because he didn't misspeak--he believes it.
In the twitter age and today's political landscape, the modes of privacy have been pushed to the rails. So even if you are only a minor celebrity, or whatever embarrassing episode you're caught in is viral, the gory details of every single part of your life could be blaring from a bullhorn on every street corner in milliseconds flat.
That, unfortunately for Simon's case, contains an egregious factual error, though one which may not have been known to Simon at the time:
The Nazis operated with horrifying effectiveness and thoroughness without the benefits of any kind of mechanized data processing.
Screenshot:
https://mastodon.cloud/@dredmorbius/103059230160200494
Source:
https://pdfs.semanticscholar.org/a9e7/33e25ee8f67d5e670b3b7d...
Unfortunately, we're now very well aware that this was not the case. Not only did Nazi German prosecute the Holocaust with the extensive aid of mechanised data processing technologies, but they did so using American technology, provided and supported, with full knowledge, by IBM:
Edwin Black has documented this in his horrific book, IBM and the Holocaust (2012)
https://ibmandtheholocaust.com
https://www.worldcat.org/title/ibm-and-the-holocaust-the-str...
To paraphrase Lord Acton, it appears that data corrupts, and absolute data corrupts absolutely.
I'm pretty sure genocide predates IBM.
Is 'computer technology' bad? If so, why are you here?
Also another good reason for people not to seek mental help, on top of being able to own a gun.
And with the recent rush to transition online, I hope this 2018 hack doesn't give the bad guys any ideas.
Socially ostracizing people for leaked mental help information is like laughing at fat people who had their gym treadmill data leaked. That's where you go to solve your problems, data leak or not.
This location exists below the cranium or somewhere securely encrypted and private.
> Socially ostracizing people for leaked mental help information is like laughing at fat people who had their gym treadmill data leaked
And like that example it happens despite whatever ideal moral system we want to espouse (never watched AFHV?). Advising people to not seek mental health care because of social acceptance is a valid concern since the consequences are real and critical. In 1952 Alan Turing admitted to performing homosexual acts and was subsequently charged with gross indecency - he was punished for sharing his secret. What do you think would happen if someone pursued mental health care to resolve a deviance in 2020?
"Hello Bob, I'm quite happy you've come to seek help with your problem... but first constable Alice would like to have a word with you. Oh, and I'm afraid you won't be allowed to leave the country or own a firearm; plus I've already spoken to your employer and he "suggests" you take a permanent leave of absence to resolve these issues. No worries Bob, just doing my job! Hm? Your girlfriend and friends dumped you after finding out? That's a shame, Bob."
If you want to act like there are no downsides to these solutions then I'm afraid you're being particularly naive. By all means fight for the right to have these people not discriminated against but don't mislead people by suggesting that you've already won the war when you clearly have not. Some lack the fortitude and recruiting them through disingenuous advertising is unethical.
Are you saying that homosexuality is a mental health topic that Alan was trying to solve earnestly in private? I don't know what to say about legal acceptance of sexual choices and it's not the same thing as earnestly trying to solve a defined mental health issue, which is a legal act. A possible legal outcome for a lot of the behaviours in therapeutic secrets would be more therapy until healed.
You can read the Turing story here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing#Conviction_for_indecenc...
My point with Turing was that here was a man who lived a decent life up until he exposed himself to society, thinking that this society would help him solve an unrelated problem. In truth, society is only motivated by self-interest (of the collective) and sometimes having you live a decent life is simply not in its best interest.
____
Okay I've skimmed your HN history for juicy secrets to make a point. You're a teenager who doesn't trust people (with some parts of yourself) and writes your secret emotions down on paper to send to fake people. You think a public psychological label is a life-and-death matter. You seem to think 'How to win friends & influence people' is an acceptable instruction book for manipulating people. So you are somewhat exposed already.
The point of therapy is to not need it anymore. If you have hang ups about it, or other topics, you should go there until you don't need to anymore. There is nothing inherently good or bad about having a socially approved and useful set of ideas to contain chaos.
The psychological disorders are like tools. They don't describe what you are, they are a useful label for closing up Pandora's box again and give people some relief from an unknown illness. Having a psychologist label you or anybody else as narcissistic, sociopathic or psychopathic is no more dangerous than being called a jay-walker. If you know what it means and what you are, then it's manageable.
There are some secrets that will get your life messed up. For every Turing, you have a Tom Cruise or the people who went to Epstein's island or whoever else has taboo secrets and still succeeds. There are not good or virtuous secrets and you are wise to be aware of their impact. The majority of secrets are uninteresting and commonplace.
> who doesn't trust people
I do not trust people because I write in a journal? How is this incriminating? I don't find it any more peculiar than speaking to oneself or opening with "dear diary" -- as if those who address their text to something inanimate are any better. I fail to see any merit in this revelation aside from attacking my character. I could try and dig up something equally irrelevant from your history but I find that act to be in poor taste.
> You seem to think 'How to win friends & influence people' is an acceptable instruction book for manipulating people
Once again the context is conveniently missing: the individual I was replying to described himself as someone who dislikes talking to average people (had a sense of superiority). I figured rather than offer him something vague and patronizing like, "be nice and try to be humble", I would endorse a resource that would offer solutions pertinent to the subject matter. I was not sharing my own personal opinions; one does not have to ascribe morality to a function in order to see merit in its execution towards an objective.
> You think a public psychological label is a life-and-death matter
Not entirely, no. But is this a minority opinion? Why would they blackmail the patients if they didn't believe that some would be willing to pay? I have recently lost someone precious to me as a result of similar circumstances and my mishandling of the situation by encouraging therapy and medication played a key role in her suicide. I apologize if my original comment appeared unnecessarily reflexive -- I'm still reeling from the guilt and I could be projecting some of that bias in my response to these types of things.
I think if something necessitates intervention then by all means seek professional care. But if you're unsure and living a decent life make sure you exhaust all other options before considering yourself diagnosed with whatever label is put in vogue by pseudo-scientists. If you think some secrets are uninteresting consider if they'll remain that way when the culture inevitably shifts and society decides to reject certain categories of people. The normal of yesterday too often becomes the enemy of a better tomorrow.
Your feeling is well-founded, as much as you are being downvoted. This is actually a huge topic in the ongoing evolution of digitizing client records in psychotherapy.
My wife (a marriage and family therapist) was taught in school that about 20 years ago insurance started requiring a diagnosis to reimburse for treatment, and ongoing treatment plans to be uploaded to their portal to continue reimbursing more than the standard 3-6 sessions most insurers felt was adequate.
This cause a HUGE backlash among psychotherapist, because depression would be considered a pre-existing condition, and also if it is on your records, life insurance was nearly impossible to secure, future non-workplace health insurance was hard to get, etc.
So everyone started using various "adjustment disorders", or acute grief (I think that's the term they use for loss of a loved one) as an ethical way around marring an otherwise healthy persons permanent record. There are times when it is more ethical to put a real diagnosis, usually so that you can have them referred to a more specialized clinician.
"Also another good reason for people not to seek mental help,"
Are you actually advocating that people ignore health issues and not seek help because the way you worded you statement it certainly seems so.
Unfortunately, there isn’t a good general solution for this stuff. For example, at some point mental illness results in loss of custody for the safety of their children. Getting that right isn’t some easy thing, and mental heath is a common enough problem that people will occasionally get this seriously wrong in both directions.
B) mostlove pointed out that this would give reason not to continue doing this in future.
We have two statements here.
These two statements when examined closely might have a connection between one another don't you think?
Could it be the case that there might be a possible rational connection between them both? That perhaps the consequences of the first might lead to the second? That a rational adult with an IQ in single digits or greater might be able to understand basic cause and effect, and that looking at a certain statement (lets pick a random one and say statement A) might lead to certain conclusions such as (lets pick at random again and pick B). Could it be that a basic understanding of human behaviour (Thing causes damage to human > human avoid thing) could have led to this conclusion being drawn?
Or would such a concept require further elaboration and perhaps diagrams to help those unable to grasp it?
Even if you receive inpatient treatment, as long as you went voluntarily, doesn’t change that.
https://www.ncsl.org/research/civil-and-criminal-justice/pos...