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This is a fairly similar argument to saying drug dealers are bad because they profit off your addiction. I don't know if I agree or disagree with that, but at w

by acchow 9y ago

This is a fairly similar argument to saying drug dealers are bad because they profit off your addiction. I don't know if I agree or disagree with that, but at what point do we actually acknowledge agency?

scythe 9y ago
Drug dealers don't have intricate control over the effects of the drugs they're selling. I imagine if synthetic drugs were legal in general rather than specific compounds you might see similar problems pop up (e.g. 3-fluoroethamphetamine, a compound screened in rats to be maximally addictive) but it's reasonable to advocate for a drug market that avoids this.
- emmab 9y ago
  > Drug dealers don't have intricate control over the effects of the drugs they're selling. yet
intended 9y ago
I think Agency is always understood to be a part of the equation - and the people with the agency are not the issue. By analogy - If the population of a city was exposed intentionally, to a cold virus - it is not the people with natural resistance, we are concerned about. We are glad those people are not affected, and know they are not part of the % affected by the virus - and then we focus on the people affected by it. --- If I were to engage with your point in the spirit it is intended, there are several issues - 1) Tech recruits the best of the best. IT pays for the smartest people in the world (and this is not hyperbole), to get past agency. This is not hard core drug dealer style sale of addiction. This is candy crush, happy smiley imagery, "just one more game", style behavioral addiction. Most people don't even know they are being addicted/affected 2) This is all at internet scale. Just on a probabilistic level, the casualties/infection is going to vastly outperform personal agency. 3) The network effects of having more people doing this, at this scale, pushes it to crisis levels very quickly. It wouldn't matter what the few immune or capable can do.

by acchow 9y ago

scythe 9y ago

Drug dealers don't have intricate control over the effects of the drugs they're selling. I imagine if synthetic drugs were legal in general rather than specific compounds you might see similar problems pop up (e.g. 3-fluoroethamphetamine, a compound screened in rats to be maximally addictive) but it's reasonable to advocate for a drug market that avoids this.

emmab 9y ago
> Drug dealers don't have intricate control over the effects of the drugs they're selling. yet

intended 9y ago

I think Agency is always understood to be a part of the equation - and the people with the agency are not the issue. By analogy - If the population of a city was exposed intentionally, to a cold virus - it is not the people with natural resistance, we are concerned about. We are glad those people are not affected, and know they are not part of the % affected by the virus - and then we focus on the people affected by it. --- If I were to engage with your point in the spirit it is intended, there are several issues - 1) Tech recruits the best of the best. IT pays for the smartest people in the world (and this is not hyperbole), to get past agency. This is not hard core drug dealer style sale of addiction. This is candy crush, happy smiley imagery, "just one more game", style behavioral addiction. Most people don't even know they are being addicted/affected 2) This is all at internet scale. Just on a probabilistic level, the casualties/infection is going to vastly outperform personal agency. 3) The network effects of having more people doing this, at this scale, pushes it to crisis levels very quickly. It wouldn't matter what the few immune or capable can do.