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It sounds like we're getting very close to violent agreement. > it doesn't seem that far-fetched that some percentage of MIT staff might feel this way. I can
by bzbarsky 6y ago
It sounds like we're getting very close to violent agreement.
> it doesn't seem that far-fetched that some percentage of MIT staff might feel this way.
I can pretty much guarantee that some percentage of MIT staff feel this way, sure. I would actually be pretty worried if MIT had, as a job requirement, anything about feelings one way or another in this area.
And yes, there has been a significant presence of military projects at MIT in general, starting with work on radar and up through the present in the form of the Lincoln Laboratory.
What I am not on board with, based on the evidence we have, is the specific claim that MIT, as an organization, is in favor of suppressing reporting of vulnerabilities that the US government or some ally is exploiting. My strong suspicion is that there is no official position on it at the Institute level, and significant diversity of opinion on the matter among MIT affiliates when viewed as individuals, though I have no data to back up those suspicions.
- meowface 6y agoI certainly agree with you on all those points, and I regret the somewhat conspiratorial implications I made. I definitely acknowledge that a large percentage of MIT faculty (and students) very likely don't share this view. Something about the slanted, biased tone of the article just really rubbed me the wrong way, whether or not it's a case of it solely being the opinion of this one writer and they just don't happen to have other cybersecurity writers, or a case of the paper having had this slant in general for a long time, or the unsubstantiated (and I think unlikely) case that any powerful people at MIT itself somehow had a direct role in the article being published or that the writer independently felt they had to toe the line with such people.