4 ms·

I wonder if someday laws will be based on a formal moral foundation instead of making things illegal just because 80% of people don't like those things. I thin

I wonder if someday laws will be based on a formal moral foundation instead of making things illegal just because 80% of people don't like those things. I think hacking is one of those things that are illegal because people don't like them. Ultimately, hacking is just sending messages through a wire. Objectively speaking, it isn't much different from hitting the like button on a Youtube video. Formally speaking, all messages sent over the Internet are numbers, so "anti-hacking laws" are essentially laws that make some arbitrary and undisclosed set of numbers illegal to send.

vkou 7y ago
Shooting people is just pulling a small lever. Objectively speaking, it's not much different from driving a car. Formally speaking, it's the same as making physical labor illegal. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. Just because you can pick the lock on my apartment door, doesn't mean that I shouldn't have an issue with it. Just because lockpicking is technically just sticking a 'key' into a lock, and turning the bolt doesn't mean it's the same bloody thing. Intent matters. Outcome matters. Somebody lockpicking my door, to save my cat from a fire, or to deal with a burst pipe, or to respond to an emergency call is one thing. Somebody lockpicking my door, to have a look at my stuff, can, and should fuck off straight to prison. Or, at least, a couple of hundred hours of community service.
- lone_haxx0r 7y ago
  I never said that anything we can do should be legal. I said that there should be a consistent moral framework upon which all laws should be based. And I think that laws should be defined objectively, not based in intent or outcome, but in facts. > Shooting people is just pulling a small lever. Objectively speaking, it's not much different from driving a car. Shooting people is more like throwing stones at them. If you own a gun, you're responsible for knowing that pulling the lever implies shooting projectiles at them. I think throwing projectiles at someone should be illegal (above some reasonable threshold of momentum. e.g (5 g * 2 m/s)). Picking someone's lock can be considered handling someone else's property without permission. (Physically) handling someone else's property without permission should also be illegal. All of these things are physical actions. The state should care about the physical actions of their citizens, but not about ideas, concepts, intent, or arbitrary abstractions. Those abstractions are the citizen's business, and legislating them is arbitrary and unfair. If I have a mental breakdown every time someone says hello to me, then should we make it illegal to say hello to me? After all, they're causing me severe mental distress and maybe I could lose my job because of these people. In my opinion, it would be unfair to ban "hello" because one person doesn't like it. It's my problem to have a mental breakdown because of specific messages, not yours or the state's. Same principle applies to software. If your website has a breakdown every time I send specific IP packets, that's your problem, not mine or the state's.
  - vkou 7y ago
    > If you own a gun, you're responsible for knowing that pulling the lever implies shooting projectiles at them. If you own a computer with the ability to send packets over TCP/IP, you're responsible for knowing what sending particular kinds of packets implies. Hacking a server you don't own is handling someone's property without permission. When I host a web service, I grant the public permission for very particular kinds of access to it. I do not grant the public permission to try to break into it. > All of these things are physical actions. The state should care about the physical actions of their citizens, but not about ideas, concepts, intent, or arbitrary abstractions. Those abstractions are the citizen's business, and legislating them is arbitrary and unfair. Your understanding of the world is incompatible with centuries of civil, criminal code, as well as millenia of common sense. Intent absolutely matters. Consider why mens rea is a thing. Consider why fraud is a thing. Consider the difference between accident, ignorance, and malice. > If I have a mental breakdown every time someone says hello to me, Are you seriously drawing an equivalence between breaking into a webserver with 'having a mental breakdown every time someone says hello'? > Same principle applies to software. If your website has a breakdown every time I send specific IP packets, that's your problem, not mine or the state's. Yes, you are. Good lord. I take it you also don't take issue with people stealing the contents of vending machines, either? After all, there's no possible way to infer what the implied contract of a vending machine is! Sure, everyone with the intellectual maturity of a five year old understands that you're supposed to put money in, in exchange for its contents... But it's the owner's fault that if I happen to tilt it over a certain way, stuff comes out of it - without me putting any money in! I'm just manipulating it in a creative way!
    - lone_haxx0r 7y ago
      > If you own a computer with the ability to send packets over TCP/IP, you're responsible for knowing what sending particular kinds of packets implies. Yes. >Hacking a server you don't own is handling someone's property without permission. I meant handling in the most literal sense: manipulating something with your hands/body. Sending a message to someone/something isn't handling them/it in that sense. > When I host a web service, I grant the public permission for very particular kinds of access to it. I do not grant the public permission to try to break into it. Morally speaking, I do not require your permission to do something that doesn't physically involve you or your property. The only relevant physical involvements here are between you and your ISP, and me and my ISP. Anything else is abstraction. Under your permissions idea, I can go out and say "I grant the public permission to look at my face but not to say hello to me." > Your understanding of the world is incompatible with centuries of civil, criminal code, as well as millenia of common sense. Your understanding of the world is incompatible with freedom and justice. > Intent absolutely matters. Consider why mens rea is a thing. Something being a thing doesn't justify it morally. Slavery is a thing, you know? Murder is a thing, etc. > I take it you also don't take issue with people stealing the contents of vending machines, either? After all, there's no possible way to infer what the implied contract of a vending machine is! Sure, everyone with the intellectual maturity of a five year old understands that you're supposed to put money in, in exchange for its contents... But it's the owner's fault that if I happen to tilt it over a certain way, stuff comes out of it - without me putting any money in! I'm just manipulating it in a creative way! In a world with laws that make sense, it would be necessary to explicitly define the contract, because otherwise everyone would be handling someone else's property without permission. Simply state in the contract that people have to pay $x in order to take out their goods. If the contract says "use this machine at will and take its contents". Then yes, you can tilt it all you want, who would have thought?

vkou 7y ago

Shooting people is just pulling a small lever. Objectively speaking, it's not much different from driving a car. Formally speaking, it's the same as making physical labor illegal. Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. Just because you can pick the lock on my apartment door, doesn't mean that I shouldn't have an issue with it. Just because lockpicking is technically just sticking a 'key' into a lock, and turning the bolt doesn't mean it's the same bloody thing. Intent matters. Outcome matters. Somebody lockpicking my door, to save my cat from a fire, or to deal with a burst pipe, or to respond to an emergency call is one thing. Somebody lockpicking my door, to have a look at my stuff, can, and should fuck off straight to prison. Or, at least, a couple of hundred hours of community service.

lone_haxx0r 7y ago
I never said that anything we can do should be legal. I said that there should be a consistent moral framework upon which all laws should be based. And I think that laws should be defined objectively, not based in intent or outcome, but in facts. > Shooting people is just pulling a small lever. Objectively speaking, it's not much different from driving a car. Shooting people is more like throwing stones at them. If you own a gun, you're responsible for knowing that pulling the lever implies shooting projectiles at them. I think throwing projectiles at someone should be illegal (above some reasonable threshold of momentum. e.g (5 g * 2 m/s)). Picking someone's lock can be considered handling someone else's property without permission. (Physically) handling someone else's property without permission should also be illegal. All of these things are physical actions. The state should care about the physical actions of their citizens, but not about ideas, concepts, intent, or arbitrary abstractions. Those abstractions are the citizen's business, and legislating them is arbitrary and unfair. If I have a mental breakdown every time someone says hello to me, then should we make it illegal to say hello to me? After all, they're causing me severe mental distress and maybe I could lose my job because of these people. In my opinion, it would be unfair to ban "hello" because one person doesn't like it. It's my problem to have a mental breakdown because of specific messages, not yours or the state's. Same principle applies to software. If your website has a breakdown every time I send specific IP packets, that's your problem, not mine or the state's.
- vkou 7y ago
  > If you own a gun, you're responsible for knowing that pulling the lever implies shooting projectiles at them. If you own a computer with the ability to send packets over TCP/IP, you're responsible for knowing what sending particular kinds of packets implies. Hacking a server you don't own is handling someone's property without permission. When I host a web service, I grant the public permission for very particular kinds of access to it. I do not grant the public permission to try to break into it. > All of these things are physical actions. The state should care about the physical actions of their citizens, but not about ideas, concepts, intent, or arbitrary abstractions. Those abstractions are the citizen's business, and legislating them is arbitrary and unfair. Your understanding of the world is incompatible with centuries of civil, criminal code, as well as millenia of common sense. Intent absolutely matters. Consider why mens rea is a thing. Consider why fraud is a thing. Consider the difference between accident, ignorance, and malice. > If I have a mental breakdown every time someone says hello to me, Are you seriously drawing an equivalence between breaking into a webserver with 'having a mental breakdown every time someone says hello'? > Same principle applies to software. If your website has a breakdown every time I send specific IP packets, that's your problem, not mine or the state's. Yes, you are. Good lord. I take it you also don't take issue with people stealing the contents of vending machines, either? After all, there's no possible way to infer what the implied contract of a vending machine is! Sure, everyone with the intellectual maturity of a five year old understands that you're supposed to put money in, in exchange for its contents... But it's the owner's fault that if I happen to tilt it over a certain way, stuff comes out of it - without me putting any money in! I'm just manipulating it in a creative way!
  - lone_haxx0r 7y ago
    > If you own a computer with the ability to send packets over TCP/IP, you're responsible for knowing what sending particular kinds of packets implies. Yes. >Hacking a server you don't own is handling someone's property without permission. I meant handling in the most literal sense: manipulating something with your hands/body. Sending a message to someone/something isn't handling them/it in that sense. > When I host a web service, I grant the public permission for very particular kinds of access to it. I do not grant the public permission to try to break into it. Morally speaking, I do not require your permission to do something that doesn't physically involve you or your property. The only relevant physical involvements here are between you and your ISP, and me and my ISP. Anything else is abstraction. Under your permissions idea, I can go out and say "I grant the public permission to look at my face but not to say hello to me." > Your understanding of the world is incompatible with centuries of civil, criminal code, as well as millenia of common sense. Your understanding of the world is incompatible with freedom and justice. > Intent absolutely matters. Consider why mens rea is a thing. Something being a thing doesn't justify it morally. Slavery is a thing, you know? Murder is a thing, etc. > I take it you also don't take issue with people stealing the contents of vending machines, either? After all, there's no possible way to infer what the implied contract of a vending machine is! Sure, everyone with the intellectual maturity of a five year old understands that you're supposed to put money in, in exchange for its contents... But it's the owner's fault that if I happen to tilt it over a certain way, stuff comes out of it - without me putting any money in! I'm just manipulating it in a creative way! In a world with laws that make sense, it would be necessary to explicitly define the contract, because otherwise everyone would be handling someone else's property without permission. Simply state in the contract that people have to pay $x in order to take out their goods. If the contract says "use this machine at will and take its contents". Then yes, you can tilt it all you want, who would have thought?