7 ms·

It should. Ethics begins at the top, and if the university has shown itself to be this untrustworthy then no trust can be had on them or any students they impli

by djbebs 6y ago

It should. Ethics begins at the top, and if the university has shown itself to be this untrustworthy then no trust can be had on them or any students they implicitly endorse. As far as I'm concerned this university and all of its alumni are radioactive.

binbag 6y ago
That's a bit much, surely. I think the ethics committee probably didn't do a great job in understanding that this was human research.
fighterpilot 6y ago
Their graduates have zero culpability here (unless they were involved). Your judgement of them is unfair.
- rualca 6y ago
  Their graduates might not have been directly involved, but it's not possible to ig ore that those graduates were the product of an academic environment where this kind of behavior was not only sanctioned from the top but also defended as an adequate use of resources.
  - psds2 6y ago
    Adequate use of resources seems like a bizarre reasoning. Do you also evaluate how a candidates alma mater compensates its football staff before you hire?
  - tester756 6y ago
    you actually believe that all of those adult engineers can't decide on their own? you think students believe in everything that profs do/say?
  - Aperocky 6y ago
    This is only slightly better than judging from the skin color or location of birth.
    - dvhh 6y ago
      Isn't academics part of how you are evaluating a candidate for a job ?
- krageon 6y ago
  > Their graduates have zero culpability here It's not about guilt, it's about trust. They were trained for years in an institution that violates trust as a matter of course. That makes them suspect and the judgement completely fair.
  - fighterpilot 6y ago
    Lots of universities have had scandals. I could probably dig one up from your alma mater. They're big places with long histories. Collective punishment achieves little productive and should be avoided.
    - krageon 6y ago
      Collective punishment is a clear and unilateral signal that something is extremely wrong and not within the punisher's power to unwind properly (or prevent in the future). Until it's clear that this university can be trusted, they should not be. I would feel the same about any schools that I attended, and I would not have issues with blanket bans for them either if this was the kind of activity they got up to.
    - jdasdf 6y ago
      Its not about collective punishment. Universities sell reputation, both good and bad. It just so happens that they sold bad reputation.
  - majormajor 6y ago
    > They were trained for years in an institution that violates trust as a matter of course. "As a matter of course" is a big leap here.
jpcosta 6y ago
That seems to me like an unjustified and unjust generalization.
- dvhh 6y ago
  I think current context of the world as it is is full of unjustified and unjust generalization. And as unfortunate as it sound it look like all victim of such generalization, the alumni would have to fight the prejudice associated to their choice of university.
Xorlev 6y ago
That's a witch hunt, and is not productive. A bad apple does not spoil the bunch, as it were. It does reflect badly on their graduate program to have retained an advisor with such poor judgement, but that isn't the fault of thousands of other excellent graduates.
- nousermane 6y ago
  It's discomforting to see "bad apple" metaphor being used to say "isolated instance with no influence to its surroundings". That is exact opposite of how rot in literal bunch of apples behave. Spoil spreads throughout the whole lot very, very quickly.
  - bobthepanda 6y ago
    Also the common phrase is “a bad apple spoils the bunch.”
    - btilly 6y ago
      Both variations are common. "It was just a few bad apples" is the one you more often see today. But it only became common after refrigeration made it so that few people now experience what is required to successfully pack apples for the winter.
- drdeca 6y ago
  Ah, so people do actually use the expression backwards like that. I had seen many people complain about other people saying “just a few bad apples”, but I couldn’t remember actually seeing anyone use the “one/few bad apple(s)” phrase as saying that it doesn’t cause or indicate a larger problem.
- blippage 6y ago
  Undoubtedly I am in the minority here, but I think it's less a question of ethics, and more a question of bad judgement. You just don't submit vulnerabilities into the kernel and then say "hey, I just deliberately submitted a security vulnerability". The chief problem here is not that it bruises the egos of the Linux developers for being psyched, but that it was a dick move whereby people now have to spend time sorting this shit out. Prof Liu miscalculated. The Linux developers are not some randos off the street where you can pay them a few bucks for a day in the lab, and then they go away and get on with whatever they were doing beforehand. It's a whole community. And he just pissed them off. It is right that Linux developers impose a social sanction on the perpetrators. It has quite possibly ruined the student's chances of ever getting a PhD, and earned Liu a rocket up the arse.
slenk 6y ago
Ok...then is everybody who graduated from MIT radioactive, even if they graduated 50 years ago, since Epstein has been involved? Your logic doesn't make ANY sense.
- jdasdf 6y ago
  It makes perfect sense once you realize that universities are in the business of selling reputation. When someone graduates from the university, that is the same as the university saying "This person is up to our standards in terms of knowledge, ethics and experience." If those standards for ethics are very low, then it naturally taints that reputation they sold.
  - tester756 6y ago
    no, when somebody graduates from X school, then it means he was capable to either pass or cheat all exams.
yiyus 6y ago
Why is the university where you put the line? You could as well say every commit coming from Minnesota is radioactive or, why not, from the US. It is unfair to judge a whole university for the behavior of a professor or a department. Although I'm far from having all the details, it looks to me like the university is taking the right measures to solve the problem, which they acknowledge. I would understand your position if they tried to hide this or negated it, but as far as I understood that's not the case at all. Did I miss something?
- tut-urut-utut 6y ago
  Linux kernel is blocking contributions from the university mail addresses, as this attack has been conducted by sending patches from there. It doesn't block patch submissions from students of professors using their private email, since that assumes they are contributing as individuals, and not as employees or students. It's as close as practically possible to blocking an institution and not the individuals.
  - yiyus 6y ago
    I think that is a reasonable measure by the LK team. In my opinion, it is the right solution in the short term, and the decision can be revised if in the future some student or someone else have problems to submit non-malicious patches. But I was specifically referring to this comment: > As far as I'm concerned this university and all of its alumni are radioactive. That is not a practical issue, but a too broad generalization (although, I repeat, I may have missed something).
    - tut-urut-utut 6y ago
      I don't read it like this. Alumnis and students are not banned from contributing, as long as they use their private emails. It's the university email domain that is "radioactive". The Assumption here is that someone who uses university email is submitting a patch on behalf of the said university, and that may be in a bad faith. It's up to the said university to show they have controls in place and that they are trustworthy. It's the same as with employees. If I get a patch request from xyz@ibm.com I'll assume that it comes from IBM, and that person is submitting a patch on behalf of IBM, while for a patch coming from xyz@gmail.com I would not assume any IBM affiliation or bias, but assume person contributing as an individual.
ClumsyPilot 6y ago
By that logic, whenever data is stolen I will blame thr nearest Facebook employee or ex-employee. And any piss I find, i will blame on amazon
krferriter 6y ago
That's a ridiculously broad assertion to make about the large number of staff and students who've graduated or are currently there, that is unwarranted and unnecessarily damaging to people who've done nothing wrong.

by djbebs 6y ago

binbag 6y ago

That's a bit much, surely. I think the ethics committee probably didn't do a great job in understanding that this was human research.

fighterpilot 6y ago

Their graduates have zero culpability here (unless they were involved). Your judgement of them is unfair.

rualca 6y ago
Their graduates might not have been directly involved, but it's not possible to ig ore that those graduates were the product of an academic environment where this kind of behavior was not only sanctioned from the top but also defended as an adequate use of resources.
- psds2 6y ago
  Adequate use of resources seems like a bizarre reasoning. Do you also evaluate how a candidates alma mater compensates its football staff before you hire?
- tester756 6y ago
  you actually believe that all of those adult engineers can't decide on their own? you think students believe in everything that profs do/say?
- Aperocky 6y ago
  This is only slightly better than judging from the skin color or location of birth.
  - dvhh 6y ago
    Isn't academics part of how you are evaluating a candidate for a job ?
krageon 6y ago
> Their graduates have zero culpability here It's not about guilt, it's about trust. They were trained for years in an institution that violates trust as a matter of course. That makes them suspect and the judgement completely fair.
- fighterpilot 6y ago
  Lots of universities have had scandals. I could probably dig one up from your alma mater. They're big places with long histories. Collective punishment achieves little productive and should be avoided.
  - krageon 6y ago
    Collective punishment is a clear and unilateral signal that something is extremely wrong and not within the punisher's power to unwind properly (or prevent in the future). Until it's clear that this university can be trusted, they should not be. I would feel the same about any schools that I attended, and I would not have issues with blanket bans for them either if this was the kind of activity they got up to.
  - jdasdf 6y ago
    Its not about collective punishment. Universities sell reputation, both good and bad. It just so happens that they sold bad reputation.
- majormajor 6y ago
  > They were trained for years in an institution that violates trust as a matter of course. "As a matter of course" is a big leap here.

jpcosta 6y ago

That seems to me like an unjustified and unjust generalization.

dvhh 6y ago
I think current context of the world as it is is full of unjustified and unjust generalization. And as unfortunate as it sound it look like all victim of such generalization, the alumni would have to fight the prejudice associated to their choice of university.

Xorlev 6y ago

That's a witch hunt, and is not productive. A bad apple does not spoil the bunch, as it were. It does reflect badly on their graduate program to have retained an advisor with such poor judgement, but that isn't the fault of thousands of other excellent graduates.

nousermane 6y ago
It's discomforting to see "bad apple" metaphor being used to say "isolated instance with no influence to its surroundings". That is exact opposite of how rot in literal bunch of apples behave. Spoil spreads throughout the whole lot very, very quickly.
- bobthepanda 6y ago
  Also the common phrase is “a bad apple spoils the bunch.”
  - btilly 6y ago
    Both variations are common. "It was just a few bad apples" is the one you more often see today. But it only became common after refrigeration made it so that few people now experience what is required to successfully pack apples for the winter.
drdeca 6y ago
Ah, so people do actually use the expression backwards like that. I had seen many people complain about other people saying “just a few bad apples”, but I couldn’t remember actually seeing anyone use the “one/few bad apple(s)” phrase as saying that it doesn’t cause or indicate a larger problem.
blippage 6y ago
Undoubtedly I am in the minority here, but I think it's less a question of ethics, and more a question of bad judgement. You just don't submit vulnerabilities into the kernel and then say "hey, I just deliberately submitted a security vulnerability". The chief problem here is not that it bruises the egos of the Linux developers for being psyched, but that it was a dick move whereby people now have to spend time sorting this shit out. Prof Liu miscalculated. The Linux developers are not some randos off the street where you can pay them a few bucks for a day in the lab, and then they go away and get on with whatever they were doing beforehand. It's a whole community. And he just pissed them off. It is right that Linux developers impose a social sanction on the perpetrators. It has quite possibly ruined the student's chances of ever getting a PhD, and earned Liu a rocket up the arse.

slenk 6y ago

Ok...then is everybody who graduated from MIT radioactive, even if they graduated 50 years ago, since Epstein has been involved? Your logic doesn't make ANY sense.

jdasdf 6y ago
It makes perfect sense once you realize that universities are in the business of selling reputation. When someone graduates from the university, that is the same as the university saying "This person is up to our standards in terms of knowledge, ethics and experience." If those standards for ethics are very low, then it naturally taints that reputation they sold.
- tester756 6y ago
  no, when somebody graduates from X school, then it means he was capable to either pass or cheat all exams.

yiyus 6y ago

Why is the university where you put the line? You could as well say every commit coming from Minnesota is radioactive or, why not, from the US. It is unfair to judge a whole university for the behavior of a professor or a department. Although I'm far from having all the details, it looks to me like the university is taking the right measures to solve the problem, which they acknowledge. I would understand your position if they tried to hide this or negated it, but as far as I understood that's not the case at all. Did I miss something?

tut-urut-utut 6y ago
Linux kernel is blocking contributions from the university mail addresses, as this attack has been conducted by sending patches from there. It doesn't block patch submissions from students of professors using their private email, since that assumes they are contributing as individuals, and not as employees or students. It's as close as practically possible to blocking an institution and not the individuals.
- yiyus 6y ago
  I think that is a reasonable measure by the LK team. In my opinion, it is the right solution in the short term, and the decision can be revised if in the future some student or someone else have problems to submit non-malicious patches. But I was specifically referring to this comment: > As far as I'm concerned this university and all of its alumni are radioactive. That is not a practical issue, but a too broad generalization (although, I repeat, I may have missed something).
  - tut-urut-utut 6y ago
    I don't read it like this. Alumnis and students are not banned from contributing, as long as they use their private emails. It's the university email domain that is "radioactive". The Assumption here is that someone who uses university email is submitting a patch on behalf of the said university, and that may be in a bad faith. It's up to the said university to show they have controls in place and that they are trustworthy. It's the same as with employees. If I get a patch request from xyz@ibm.com I'll assume that it comes from IBM, and that person is submitting a patch on behalf of IBM, while for a patch coming from xyz@gmail.com I would not assume any IBM affiliation or bias, but assume person contributing as an individual.

ClumsyPilot 6y ago

By that logic, whenever data is stolen I will blame thr nearest Facebook employee or ex-employee. And any piss I find, i will blame on amazon

krferriter 6y ago

That's a ridiculously broad assertion to make about the large number of staff and students who've graduated or are currently there, that is unwarranted and unnecessarily damaging to people who've done nothing wrong.