...More fun and games from the "We're Monkeys, we'll *go*!!!" school of disputation...
:-). Cheers, RAH --- begin forwarded text Status: U Date: Mon, 24 Jun 2002 07:58:45 +0530 To: Robert Hettinga <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> From: Udhay Shankar N <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Fwd: Re: Fwd: Book Review: Peter Wayner's "Translucent Databases" <x-flowed>Bob, I forwarded your review of Wayner's book to, among others, David Brin. He sent this reply, asking me to pass it on. Seems to have touched a nerve! Udhay >Uday, thanks for sharing this. > >Could you submit the following reply? > >--------------- > >It is particularly dishonest of a so-called reviewer not only to >misinterpret and misconvey another person's position, but to abuse >quotation marks in the way Robert Hettinga has done in his review of >Translucent Databases By Peter Wayner. Openly and publicly, I defy >Hettinga to find any place where I used the word "trust" in the fashion or >meaning he attributes to me. > >In fact, my argument is diametrically opposite to the one that he portrays >as mine. For him to say that 'Brin seems to want, "trust" of state >force-monopolists... their lawyers and apparatchiks." demonstrates either >profound laziness - having never read a word I wrote - or else deliberate >calumny. In either event, I now openly hold him accountable by calling it >a damnable lie. This is not a person to be trusted or listened-to by >people who value credibility. > >Without intending-to, he laid bare one of the 'false dichotomies" that >trap even bright people into either-or - or zero-sum - kinds of >thinking. For example, across the political spectrum, a "Strong Privacy" >movement claims that liberty and personal privacy are best defended by >anonymity and encryption, or else by ornate laws restricting what people >may know. This approach may seem appealing, but there are no historical >examples of it ever having worked. > >INdeed, those mired in these two approaches seem unable to see outside the >dichotomy. Hettinga thinks that, because I am skeptical of the right >wing's passion for cowboy anonymity, that I am therefore automatically an >advocate of the left wing's prescription of "privacy through state >coercive information management'. Baloney. A plague on both houses of >people who seem obsessed with policing what other people are allowed to know. > >Strong Privacy advocates bears a severe burden of proof when they claim >that a world of secrets will protect freedom... even privacy... better >than what has worked for us so far - general openness. > >Indeed, it's a burden of proof that can sometimes be met! Certainly there >are circumstances when/where secrecy is the only recourse... in concealing >the location of shelters for battered wives, for instance, or in fiercely >defending psychiatric records. These examples stand at one end of a >sliding scale whose principal measure is the amount of harm that a piece >of information might plausibly do, if released in an unfair manner. At >the other end of the scale, new technologies seem to make it likely that >we'll just have to get used to changes in our definition of privacy. What >salad dressing you use may be as widely known as what color sweater you >wear on the street... and just as harmlessly boring. > >The important thing to remember is that anyone who claims a right to keep >something secret is also claiming a right to deny knowledge to >others. There is an inherent conflict! Some kind of criterion must be >used to adjudicate this tradeoff and most sensible people seem to agree >that this criterion should be real or plausible harm... not simply whether >or not somebody likes to keep personal data secret. > > >The modern debate over information, and who controls it, must begin with a >paradox. > >(1) Each of us understands that knowledge can be power. We want to know as >much as possible about people or groups we see as threatening... and we >want our opponents to know little about us. Each of us would prescribe >armor for "the good guys" and nakedness for our worst foes. > >(2) Criticism is the best antidote to error. Yet most people, especially >the mighty, try to avoid it. Leaders of past civilizations evaded >criticism by crushing free speech and public access to information. This >sometimes helped them stay in power... but it also generally resulted in >horrific blunders in statecraft. > >3) Ours may be the first civilization to systematically avoid this cycle, >whose roots lie in human nature. We have learned that few people are >mature enough to hold themselves accountable. But in an open society where >criticism flows, adversaries eagerly pounce on each others' errors. We do >each other the favor of reciprocal criticism (though it seldom personally >feels like a favor!) > > >Four great social innovations foster our unprecedented wealth and freedom: >science, justice, democracy & free markets. Each of these "accountability >arenas" functions best when all players get fair access to information. >But cheating is always a problem because of (1) and (2) above. It's a >paradox, all right. > >While new surveillance and data technologies pose vexing challenges, we >may be wise to pause and recall what worked for us so far. Reciprocal >accountability - a widely shared power to shine light, even on the mighty >- is the unsung marvel of our age, empowering even eccentrics and >minorities to enforce their own freedom. Shall we scrap civilization's >best tool - light - in favor of a fad of secrecy? > >Across the political spectrum, a "Strong Privacy" movement claims that >liberty and personal privacy are best defended by anonymity and >encryption, or else by ornate laws restricting what people may know. This >approach may seem appealing, but there are no historical examples of it >ever having worked. > > >Here are a few themes discussed in The Transparent Society: > >* Cameras and surveillance devices swarm our technological world, >multiplying and getting harder to spot each day. A "Moore's Law of >Cameras" shows them halving in size, doubling in acuity and movement >capability and sheer numbers, every year or so. Passing laws won't stop >them. Robert Heinlein said: "Privacy laws only make the bugs smaller... >and limit their use to some elite." > >But there may be another solution. > >* Knowledge is the ultimate drug, and forbidden knowledge is craved above >all. Credit companies, banned from holding bankruptcy records beyond 7 >years, now ship the taboo information to offshore 'data havens.' Shall we >create an underground economy in contraband information, as we have done >with drugs? Who will benefit? > >* One wing of the Strong Privacy crusade wants Euro-style privacy >commissions with a myriad laws and clerks to police what may be known by >doctors, corporations, and individuals. Dataflow controls may indeed be >needed at times! But this solution should be a last resort, not the first >place we turn. > >* Another wing of wing of Strong Privacy likes libertarian techno-fixes -- >empowering individuals with encrypted cybernetic anonymity. But scientific >and social flaws may render these panaceas no more effective than 'ghost >shirts'. Even if they can be made to work, it may just empower a new >elite - those who best know-how to use the new masks and armor. > >* Is government the chief enemy of freedom? That authority center does >merit close scrutiny... which we've been applying lately with >unprecedented ardor. Meanwhile other citizens worry about different power >groups -- aristocracies, corporations, criminal gangs, and technological >elites. Should 'suspicion of authority' apply in all directions? Can >anyone justifiably claim exemption from accountability? > >* Privacy and personal safety are better safeguarded by catching peeping >toms. Freedom thrives when we turn 'henchmen' into >whistle-blowers. Elites will always have some advantages, but we're all >better protected by knowing than by forbidding others to know. (It is far >easier to verify that you know something, than to verify that someone else >is ignorant.) > >* Why do our "accountability arenas" work so well? Science, justice, >democracy & free markets are direct products of openness... most of the >people knowing most of what's going on, most of the time. Even individual >eccentricity seems to flourish best in light. Closed societies have >always been more conformist than open ones! > > >Many of these points may seem counter-intuitive... but so is our entire >rambunctious, argumentative, tolerant, eccentric, in-your-face culture! >The Transparent Society explores underlying issues, from the technological >(cameras, databases and the science of encryption) to the startling (why >all our films preach suspicion of authority), helping foster a new >appreciation of our unique civilization. > >Defying the temptations of secrecy, we may see a culture like no other, >filled with boisterous amateurs and individuals whose hunger for >betterment will propel the next century. This will happen if we stick to a >formula that already works... most of the people knowing most of what's >going on, most of the time. > > >==================================================================== > > >"New tech is handing society tough decisions to make anew about old issues >of privacy and accountability. In opting for omni-directional openness, >David Brin takes an unorthodox position, arguing knowledgeably and with >exceptionally balanced perspective." > - Stewart Brand, Director, Global Business Network > >"As David Brin details the inevitability of ubiquitous surveillance, your >instinct, as an individual facing this one-way mirror, is to hope that he >is wrong about the facts. As you follow his argument for two-way social >transparency, you realize your only hope is that he is right." > - George B. Dyson, author, Darwin Among the Machines > >"Where, in the information age, do we draw the line between privacy and >openness? David Brin's answer is illuminated by his insistence that >criticism is as vital to eliminating our errors as the T-cells of our >immune system are to maintaining our health. . . . Brin's informed and >lucid advocacy of fresh air is very welcome." > - Arthur Kantrowitz, Professor of Engineering, Dartmouth College > >"David Brin is one of the few people thinking and writing about the social >problems we are going to face in the near future as the result of new >electronic media. The Transparent Society raises the questions we need to >ask now, before the universal surveillance infrastructure is in place. Be >prepared to have your assumptions challenged." > - Howard Rheingold, author, The Virtual Community > >"The Transparent Society reframes the debate on what our world can >become-and the choices aren't what they may seem." > - K. Eric Drexler, author, Engines of Creation > >"David Brin's nonfiction marvel, The Transparent Society, is what Lewis >Mumford or Thorstein Veblen might write, could they contemplate our >increasingly webbed world and its prospects for social change. It's what >Benjamin Franklin or Thomas Jefferson would be writing these days about >technology and democracy. Brin's book is full of imaginative, far-sighted >concern for how fluid information is going to transform our civil society. >Knowledge only occasionally leads to wisdom, but here we see some, and the >book is so wonderfully entertaining that it's bound to be widely read." > - William H. Calvin, neurophysiologist and author of How Brains > Think. > > > For more > information, see: <http://www.davidbrin.com/>http://www.davidbrin.com/ > -- ((Udhay Shankar N)) ((udhay @ pobox.com)) ((www.digeratus.com)) God is silent. Now if we can only get Man to shut up. </x-flowed> --- end forwarded text -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED]> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire' -- ----------------- R. A. Hettinga <mailto: [EMAIL PROTECTED]> The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
