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What if we legalize murder? People will be forced to be nicer to one another. People will learn self defense and become stronger and more capable. There will b

What if we legalize murder? People will be forced to be nicer to one another. People will learn self defense and become stronger and more capable. There will be more gun safety because everyone will be trained in gun use properly. Fewer spouses will cheat. It will be a great world for everybody.

darawk 10y ago
I don't know if that's quite a fair comparison. Physical self-defense is a cost we all would have to incur all the time. Software security, on the other hand, can be paid in a bit more of a centralized way by companies who are paying that cost anyway. Obviously this is a thought experiment and probably shouldn't actually be done, but I think the murder comparison is slightly unfair to the idea.
- joe_the_user 10y ago
  If we think what would really happen if murder was "legalized", the comparison is fairly apt. Essentially, the state would have abandoned its job of providing protection and average people would be left to their own devices. But more importantly, who ever had power in other capacities would be tempted to use murder to solve their problems, including getting people to pay bills on time and stuff. The legality of murder is kind of what separates a mafia-state from a regular state. Murder isn't constant in a mafia state but the strong are willing to prey on the weak ruthlessly there. Similarly, if hacking is legal, every legitimate software vendor will be happy to put backdoors in their product - and use those backdoors against those too weak to fight back. Which is to say, the thing the "legalize hacking and people will be more careful about criminals" and similar arguments misses is that the laws have the important effect of making it more likely that only "criminals", people outside normal society, will do crime. When those with power and money also do crime, the average person suffers pretty badly (and the law doesn't guarantee the end of corruption, just makes it a bit less likely).
  - darawk 10y ago
    > Similarly, if hacking is legal, every legitimate software vendor will be happy to put backdoors in their product - and use those backdoors against those too weak to fight back. That isn't necessarily true. It is, for instance, not illegal to make shitty quality products that break down, or provide low quality services. But companies that do that develop a reputation for doing so, and are penalized for it in the market place. That is to say, if you were to legalize cybercrime, yes, some companies would try to capitalize on that. But others would then move to fill that hole in the market place by being honest. And once their credibility and therefore future profits are predicated on that honesty, they will be highly incentivized to protect it. This is vaguely analogous to the argument that security by obscurity is bad. If our computer networks and systems are secure due to the threat of violence of the state and not due to their inherent security, are they really secure? Now, I think the nuance here is that sometimes this sort of argument is correct and sometimes it is not. When two forms of safety compete, they crowd each other out. - When the state prevents murder, people don't have to. - When the state prevents cybercrime, vendors don't have to. - When your security procedures are secret, they're harder to exploit (until they become known). Sometimes the tradeoffs involved are good, and sometimes they are bad. In the cases of the two cited instances on the ends, which is which is pretty clear. But #2 pretty clearly falls somewhere in the middle. Why that is true can be seen by analyzing the likely components of that value equation: - How good is the state at preventing thing X? - What would the cost of that burden be on the private sector? In the case of murder, the state is pretty good at preventing it - not nearly as much in the case of cybercrime. The cost of everyone protecting themselves from murder at all times would be astronomical, as there is no scalable way to do that. The cost of software security on the other hand, is not nearly as high. So, while it likely still ends up to be a bad idea on balance, I think there is an interesting case to be made in that direction, at least as a thought experiment.
    - slededit 10y ago
      > That isn't necessarily true. It is, for instance, not illegal to make shitty quality products that break down, or provide low quality services. But companies that do that develop a reputation for doing so, and are penalized for it in the market place. That really depends on both the jurisdiction and the product. The USA is the exception not the norm here, and even in that regard still has strict laws on big ticket items like appliances and automobiles.
- JumpCrisscross 10y ago
  The analogy is hyperbolic but apt. States exist to hold a monopoly on violence and protect property rights. One takes priority to the other, but they're both fundamental raisons d'être.
  - walterbell 10y ago
    Yes and we know what preceded the state's monopoly on violence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_of_Westphalia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_of_Westphalia
  - dragonwriter 10y ago
    No, one is a potential raising d'être, the other is just a definitional requirement for being a state -- whatever entity or collection of entities holds a monopoly on legitimate violence in a region is, ipso facto, the state, no matter what it's reasons for existing are.
  - scandox 10y ago
    Exactly. If we legalize crime we just move from monopoly to oligopoly. Frankly the state's monopoly is my preference for as long as it remains broadly representational of the interests of its citizens.
  - darawk 10y ago
    I'm not sure what you're arguing against there. Nobody is advocating or even talking about relinquishing the state's monopoly on violence.
    - JumpCrisscross 10y ago
      > I'm not sure what you're arguing against The top commenter analogized, jestfully, legalizing homicide with legalizing cybercrime [1]. A second comment said this comparison was unfair [2]. My comment [3] responds to that second comment. In essence, if a state's claim to a monopoly on violence is legitimate, then its claim to protecting property rights is (almost) as valid. Thus, advocating a dissolution of the latter, e.g. legalizing cybercrime, can be compared, as a legal argumentum ad absurdum, with permitting murder. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266097 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266097 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266146 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266749 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266749
logfromblammo 10y ago
Yeah... I'm going to need a Poe's Law check on this one.
- bmmayer1 10y ago
  /s
patcon 10y ago
Maybe this would be a better analogy if you could murder a bunch of people at once, and no one, including the victim would ever notice. Or maybe if solving one murder prevented all future murders of the same type. Or maybe I should just read this as a punchy response, rather than a decent analogy. In which case I should probably just downvote the comment as sensationalist ;)
mozumder 10y ago
Pretty sure we'll all just end up killing off people to form our own mini kingdoms. The warlords with the most kills wins control of their domains. Basically this is what happens at the international level, since there is no global authority - countries can kill as much as they want. And they established themselves through killings. If you do that at the local level, you will end up with the same - lots of warlords establishing themselves through killings, assisted by forming alliances, etc..
pasbesoin 10y ago
Heinlein: "Beyond This Horizon". One of his earlier works, with their contemporary-culture-driven stereotypes; nonetheless interesting. P.S. A lot of murder in today's world is currently de facto "legal", whatever some doctrine written down somewhere may say. Having an honest perspective towards, recounting of, and analysis of this might improve our approach to building and maintaining societies. P.P.S. I'm not advocating for murder, but for a more honest conversation about power dynamics -- and communication of this to younger people learning to navigate the world.
zamalek 10y ago
We are slowly moving towards anarchy. I'm still not sure how I feel about that.
ax 10y ago
The tragedy of Galois is that he could have contributed so much more to mathematics if he'd only spent more time on his marksmanship.
lcfcjs 10y ago
What if we legalize guns? People would live in fear, and crazy people could shoot up schools and movie theaters, whenever they want to. Oh, wait that's reality in the USA.
burke 10y ago
I think a better analogy here would be fraud.
pjc50 10y ago
This is why we need sarcasm markers on the internet. Not just for this comment but the entire thread is full of propositions that are ridiculous on their face.
appleflaxen 10y ago
Cyber attacks are financial, and involve money and information. Murder is the permanent end to a human being's life. The difference makes your argument a non sequitur.

darawk 10y ago

I don't know if that's quite a fair comparison. Physical self-defense is a cost we all would have to incur all the time. Software security, on the other hand, can be paid in a bit more of a centralized way by companies who are paying that cost anyway. Obviously this is a thought experiment and probably shouldn't actually be done, but I think the murder comparison is slightly unfair to the idea.

joe_the_user 10y ago
If we think what would really happen if murder was "legalized", the comparison is fairly apt. Essentially, the state would have abandoned its job of providing protection and average people would be left to their own devices. But more importantly, who ever had power in other capacities would be tempted to use murder to solve their problems, including getting people to pay bills on time and stuff. The legality of murder is kind of what separates a mafia-state from a regular state. Murder isn't constant in a mafia state but the strong are willing to prey on the weak ruthlessly there. Similarly, if hacking is legal, every legitimate software vendor will be happy to put backdoors in their product - and use those backdoors against those too weak to fight back. Which is to say, the thing the "legalize hacking and people will be more careful about criminals" and similar arguments misses is that the laws have the important effect of making it more likely that only "criminals", people outside normal society, will do crime. When those with power and money also do crime, the average person suffers pretty badly (and the law doesn't guarantee the end of corruption, just makes it a bit less likely).
- darawk 10y ago
  > Similarly, if hacking is legal, every legitimate software vendor will be happy to put backdoors in their product - and use those backdoors against those too weak to fight back. That isn't necessarily true. It is, for instance, not illegal to make shitty quality products that break down, or provide low quality services. But companies that do that develop a reputation for doing so, and are penalized for it in the market place. That is to say, if you were to legalize cybercrime, yes, some companies would try to capitalize on that. But others would then move to fill that hole in the market place by being honest. And once their credibility and therefore future profits are predicated on that honesty, they will be highly incentivized to protect it. This is vaguely analogous to the argument that security by obscurity is bad. If our computer networks and systems are secure due to the threat of violence of the state and not due to their inherent security, are they really secure? Now, I think the nuance here is that sometimes this sort of argument is correct and sometimes it is not. When two forms of safety compete, they crowd each other out. - When the state prevents murder, people don't have to. - When the state prevents cybercrime, vendors don't have to. - When your security procedures are secret, they're harder to exploit (until they become known). Sometimes the tradeoffs involved are good, and sometimes they are bad. In the cases of the two cited instances on the ends, which is which is pretty clear. But #2 pretty clearly falls somewhere in the middle. Why that is true can be seen by analyzing the likely components of that value equation: - How good is the state at preventing thing X? - What would the cost of that burden be on the private sector? In the case of murder, the state is pretty good at preventing it - not nearly as much in the case of cybercrime. The cost of everyone protecting themselves from murder at all times would be astronomical, as there is no scalable way to do that. The cost of software security on the other hand, is not nearly as high. So, while it likely still ends up to be a bad idea on balance, I think there is an interesting case to be made in that direction, at least as a thought experiment.
  - slededit 10y ago
    > That isn't necessarily true. It is, for instance, not illegal to make shitty quality products that break down, or provide low quality services. But companies that do that develop a reputation for doing so, and are penalized for it in the market place. That really depends on both the jurisdiction and the product. The USA is the exception not the norm here, and even in that regard still has strict laws on big ticket items like appliances and automobiles.
JumpCrisscross 10y ago
The analogy is hyperbolic but apt. States exist to hold a monopoly on violence and protect property rights. One takes priority to the other, but they're both fundamental raisons d'être.
- walterbell 10y ago
  Yes and we know what preceded the state's monopoly on violence: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_of_Westphalia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peace_of_Westphalia
- dragonwriter 10y ago
  No, one is a potential raising d'être, the other is just a definitional requirement for being a state -- whatever entity or collection of entities holds a monopoly on legitimate violence in a region is, ipso facto, the state, no matter what it's reasons for existing are.
- scandox 10y ago
  Exactly. If we legalize crime we just move from monopoly to oligopoly. Frankly the state's monopoly is my preference for as long as it remains broadly representational of the interests of its citizens.
- darawk 10y ago
  I'm not sure what you're arguing against there. Nobody is advocating or even talking about relinquishing the state's monopoly on violence.
  - JumpCrisscross 10y ago
    > I'm not sure what you're arguing against The top commenter analogized, jestfully, legalizing homicide with legalizing cybercrime [1]. A second comment said this comparison was unfair [2]. My comment [3] responds to that second comment. In essence, if a state's claim to a monopoly on violence is legitimate, then its claim to protecting property rights is (almost) as valid. Thus, advocating a dissolution of the latter, e.g. legalizing cybercrime, can be compared, as a legal argumentum ad absurdum, with permitting murder. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266097 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266097 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266146 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266146 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266749 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13266749

logfromblammo 10y ago

Yeah... I'm going to need a Poe's Law check on this one.

bmmayer1 10y ago
/s

patcon 10y ago

Maybe this would be a better analogy if you could murder a bunch of people at once, and no one, including the victim would ever notice. Or maybe if solving one murder prevented all future murders of the same type. Or maybe I should just read this as a punchy response, rather than a decent analogy. In which case I should probably just downvote the comment as sensationalist ;)

mozumder 10y ago

Pretty sure we'll all just end up killing off people to form our own mini kingdoms. The warlords with the most kills wins control of their domains. Basically this is what happens at the international level, since there is no global authority - countries can kill as much as they want. And they established themselves through killings. If you do that at the local level, you will end up with the same - lots of warlords establishing themselves through killings, assisted by forming alliances, etc..

pasbesoin 10y ago

Heinlein: "Beyond This Horizon". One of his earlier works, with their contemporary-culture-driven stereotypes; nonetheless interesting. P.S. A lot of murder in today's world is currently de facto "legal", whatever some doctrine written down somewhere may say. Having an honest perspective towards, recounting of, and analysis of this might improve our approach to building and maintaining societies. P.P.S. I'm not advocating for murder, but for a more honest conversation about power dynamics -- and communication of this to younger people learning to navigate the world.

zamalek 10y ago

We are slowly moving towards anarchy. I'm still not sure how I feel about that.

ax 10y ago

The tragedy of Galois is that he could have contributed so much more to mathematics if he'd only spent more time on his marksmanship.

lcfcjs 10y ago

What if we legalize guns? People would live in fear, and crazy people could shoot up schools and movie theaters, whenever they want to. Oh, wait that's reality in the USA.

burke 10y ago

I think a better analogy here would be fraud.

pjc50 10y ago

This is why we need sarcasm markers on the internet. Not just for this comment but the entire thread is full of propositions that are ridiculous on their face.

appleflaxen 10y ago

Cyber attacks are financial, and involve money and information. Murder is the permanent end to a human being's life. The difference makes your argument a non sequitur.