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> The NSA is not credible. - Somewhat technical internet user

sumedh 9y ago
well the NSA chief lied to US congress. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2013/06/fire_dni_james_clapper_he_lied_to_congress_about_nsa_surveillance.html http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/...
- anigbrowl 9y ago
  Well that's it then, one lie ends everything. I had a program crash on me once, never used it again. I'm being flippant but while I wouldn't advise you to trust the NSA it's equally foolish to assume an antagonistic posture towards it forever more in everything. Military forces sometimes kill innocent people which is terrible, and even worse than lying, but you don't see any country deciding not to have one, for reasons that I hope are obvious. We live in a very imperfect world and it's not obvious how to rid ourselves of war, militarism, greed and so on because of the perverse economic incentives that prevail at this time in history. So I feel we should be very skeptical of our institutions, but not to the point of perversity or reflexive rejection thereof, which would make us as easy to manipulate as reflexive approval.
  - abecedarius 9y ago
    When a known liar says X, it means they've calculated that saying X is a good move in whatever game they're playing. This tells us little about whether X is the case. I mean, if they've since made a credible effort to restore their reputation somehow, we may start to give their pronouncements some direct weight in our own models of the world, but until then, why would you? This is beside any matter of morality.
    - anigbrowl 9y ago
      Because it would be irrational to assume that they lie all the time. You are right that they've calculated it to be a good move, but good moves are not universally applicable. You should definitely give lower weight to the statements of an actor with a record of being untruthful - we could get into discussing how Clapper is no longer at the NSA and that equating the NSA with his statements to Congress is a fallacy of composition, but let's go with the idea that the NSA as an institution is rather untrustworthy. What I'm arguing against is reflexively reducing that weight to zero, which I claim is irrational. Morality is something that is important in decision-making, but extremely distracting in analysis, so I ignore it when trying to figure out what people are doing or whether they're truthful.
- mythrwy 9y ago
  Which says to the American people... '''You aren't in control at any level of your government. You can elect representation, but fuck them, and fuck you. We run the show around here and we do as we please.''' The long term cost of this implication, to the organization, to the government, to society in general is more than if he just presented power points of the secret plans on YouTube.

well the NSA chief lied to US congress. http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/2013/06/fire_dni_james_clapper_he_lied_to_congress_about_nsa_surveillance.html http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/war_stories/...

anigbrowl 9y ago
Well that's it then, one lie ends everything. I had a program crash on me once, never used it again. I'm being flippant but while I wouldn't advise you to trust the NSA it's equally foolish to assume an antagonistic posture towards it forever more in everything. Military forces sometimes kill innocent people which is terrible, and even worse than lying, but you don't see any country deciding not to have one, for reasons that I hope are obvious. We live in a very imperfect world and it's not obvious how to rid ourselves of war, militarism, greed and so on because of the perverse economic incentives that prevail at this time in history. So I feel we should be very skeptical of our institutions, but not to the point of perversity or reflexive rejection thereof, which would make us as easy to manipulate as reflexive approval.
- abecedarius 9y ago
  When a known liar says X, it means they've calculated that saying X is a good move in whatever game they're playing. This tells us little about whether X is the case. I mean, if they've since made a credible effort to restore their reputation somehow, we may start to give their pronouncements some direct weight in our own models of the world, but until then, why would you? This is beside any matter of morality.
  - anigbrowl 9y ago
    Because it would be irrational to assume that they lie all the time. You are right that they've calculated it to be a good move, but good moves are not universally applicable. You should definitely give lower weight to the statements of an actor with a record of being untruthful - we could get into discussing how Clapper is no longer at the NSA and that equating the NSA with his statements to Congress is a fallacy of composition, but let's go with the idea that the NSA as an institution is rather untrustworthy. What I'm arguing against is reflexively reducing that weight to zero, which I claim is irrational. Morality is something that is important in decision-making, but extremely distracting in analysis, so I ignore it when trying to figure out what people are doing or whether they're truthful.
mythrwy 9y ago
Which says to the American people... '''You aren't in control at any level of your government. You can elect representation, but fuck them, and fuck you. We run the show around here and we do as we please.''' The long term cost of this implication, to the organization, to the government, to society in general is more than if he just presented power points of the secret plans on YouTube.