4 ms·

The problem is that there are infinitely better questions to ask - like, "oh, what's your day-to-day like?" or "who do you work for? what do you work on?" - rat

The problem is that there are infinitely better questions to ask - like, "oh, what's your day-to-day like?" or "who do you work for? what do you work on?" - rather than terrible technical questions. ===== > I think there's a false assumption here that somehow @cyberomin's ability to actually _solve_ a BST was in some way tied to his likelihood of entry. That's obviously ridiculous. You just got off a plane. You've been in the air for the past 23 hours. The agencies in charge of border security at your arrival airport have a reputation, and a well-deserved one at that, for (1) harassing foreigners, (2) having unclear policies, and (3) more recently, having no idea what the actual law is (or actually outright disobeying it). Still think it's that ridiculous? ===== On top of that, there's a long history in our industry of people reading questions and answers off pre-prepared lists and saying "oh, your nuanced, correct answer doesn't match up with what I've got written down here - sorry, I'm trashing your application". While it would absolutely disgust me to see the TSA/CBP use something like that, I would also be completely unsurprised to see it happen - especially if it happened to a non-US citizen, since they have next to no legal standing in the U.S.

wrasee 10y ago
I think this gets to the heart of how so much of this discussion misses the point. The question is not about solving CS problems. It's about determining the authenticity of the passenger's story. In this example, provided that the border agent is at least sufficiently aware that a BST question is a 'hard problem', the question may have simply been posed to observe if the passenger reacts appropriately to that. Even if the answer is "look, I've just been on a plane for 23 hours! you couldn't possibly expect me to..?", You're right, the agent couldn't. Tick! The response is consistent with the passenger's story. It's a bluff. Which is to stress a more important point: it's not for us to second guess the subtleties of a border agent's questioning. That's part of their professional training. -- That is of course, unless we have cause to believe the questioning is in some way unethical. And you raise (1), (2) and (3) that are clearly examples of unethical behaviour. But with respect to this story - where is the evidence that any of this happened? [1] This is _precisely_ why we should be careful not to generalize and be accurate in our criticism - if we are to be taken seriously in an area where there is understandably much cause for concern. [1]: To be clear: A technical question about a passenger's stated profession is not unethical. Yes, it would be unethical if the quality of the _technical_ answer was somehow tied to admittance. But again there's no evidence that that happened.

wrasee 10y ago

I think this gets to the heart of how so much of this discussion misses the point. The question is not about solving CS problems. It's about determining the authenticity of the passenger's story. In this example, provided that the border agent is at least sufficiently aware that a BST question is a 'hard problem', the question may have simply been posed to observe if the passenger reacts appropriately to that. Even if the answer is "look, I've just been on a plane for 23 hours! you couldn't possibly expect me to..?", You're right, the agent couldn't. Tick! The response is consistent with the passenger's story. It's a bluff. Which is to stress a more important point: it's not for us to second guess the subtleties of a border agent's questioning. That's part of their professional training. -- That is of course, unless we have cause to believe the questioning is in some way unethical. And you raise (1), (2) and (3) that are clearly examples of unethical behaviour. But with respect to this story - where is the evidence that any of this happened? [1] This is _precisely_ why we should be careful not to generalize and be accurate in our criticism - if we are to be taken seriously in an area where there is understandably much cause for concern. [1]: To be clear: A technical question about a passenger's stated profession is not unethical. Yes, it would be unethical if the quality of the _technical_ answer was somehow tied to admittance. But again there's no evidence that that happened.