5 ms·

This doesn't bother me. I get that it's being equivalated to living in a police state but I don't view it that way. Police or FBI patrolling more efficiently se

This doesn't bother me. I get that it's being equivalated to living in a police state but I don't view it that way. Police or FBI patrolling more efficiently seems progressive and economical. When I'm in public I expect that I don't have privacy. EDIT: typo

northwest 13y ago
I didn't downvote you, I can't. But I think, you are seriously wrong. And it's because because you lack to see what all this will enable, abuse-wise. I'm pretty sure you will change your mind once you'll effectively feel the consequences. The thing is, if we, as a society want to advance, we need to reflect more on what is happening.
- DannyBee 13y ago
  I agree with you, except where you say "I'm pretty sure you will change your mind once you'll effectively feel the consequences. " No, actually, he won't. 20 years from now, when things are much worse, he won't complain then either. While what they say about boiling frogs is patently false for frogs (they will jump out), it's completely true for humans.
  - northwest 13y ago
    Here you go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
  - adestefan 13y ago
    Why do you instantly assume that 20 years from now things will be "much worse?" Even though I have no idea what "much worse" would even be.
    - fargolime 13y ago
      Why wouldn't a reasonable person assume that, given the historical trend? The gov't has been steadily implementing the strategies laid out in the book 1984, my whole longish life.
    - DannyBee 13y ago
      Please give me one time in the history of the US where privacy that was lost was later regained?
noonespecial 13y ago
I'm going to have to disagree. The possibilty that you might be observed in public is a whole different animal than the probabilty or even certainty that you will. Knowing that someone might be watching is different than being sure that someone is. And that is just where this train is headed. Edit: I'm going to go ahead and urge people not to knee-jerk downvote the parent here. Outside of a certain group of the HN crowd, I find this to be the prevailing opinion. A downvote is just a shout of "you're wrong". We need to start educating people of the consequences of ubiquitous surveillance carried to its logical end.
- darkxanthos 13y ago
  I appreciate the call to not down vote. I see a larger picture of things getting out of hand surely. The issue I have with drones and being watched all the time is that there are so many laws we all probably break one daily and that opens us to be treated as criminals. I'd rather have fewer laws and perhaps further increase the burden of proof necessary to bring charges.
  - fargolime 13y ago
    If you see the larger picture of where things will be, why not be bothered by movement down that slippery slope?
    - darkxanthos 13y ago
      I try to focus on root causes. There's too much noise and wasted energy otherwise.
      - deleted 13y ago
        [deleted]
- rdtsc 13y ago
  Even more so, the constant fear of being watched changes who you are, how you act and the choices you make, even how you think. That is the whole idea behind the concept of the Panopticon. Just putting cameras that might not even work in places or put those dark glass domes like you see in the stores makes one act and feel different. There is an expectation of how police works with a given set of constraints. It seems like a _quantitative_ difference whether a police car can drive by and see your house or a police car is assigned to follow you vs small drone constantly hovering above your house or a tracking device attached to your car. Legally those are the same but they shouldn't be. The distinction is so dramatic like you put it that it is a _qualitative_ difference between the two cases, not just a matter of degree.
smokeyj 13y ago
> I get that it's being equivalted to living in a police state but I don't view it that way Largest prison population, largest military, and the end of the Fourth Amendment. I'm curious, would you support making the Gestapo more efficient at what they do?
- potatolicious 13y ago
  Parent poster expressed an (unpopular) opinion in a civil way. Your response purely in snark and invoking Godwin (two posts in!) is unwarranted.
  - smokeyj 13y ago
    > Your response purely in snark I listed supporting arguments to the contrary.. > and invoking Godwin (two posts in!) is unwarranted I expressed an unpopular opinion in a civil way, and your response is pure snark. I didn't mean to offend you by saying the G word. Maybe I'll talk about another over-reaching police force. Would that be more palatable for you?
    - potatolicious 13y ago
      > "I listed supporting arguments to the contrary.." Yeah, and those were fine. It's like writing a great refutation and ending it with "but sure, go have tea with Hitler". The snarky "you don't support us so clearly you must support [insert evil thing]" undermines a valid point made, and verges on ad hominem. The parallels of the ubiquitous American surveillance state certainly have shades of the Stasi or the Gestapo, but the insinuation that OP must, by virtue of his disagreement with you, support the extreme end of this institution, is unjustified. He stated his opinion with civility, the accusatory, with-us-or-with-pure-evil angle is unwarranted and cheapens the discourse.
      - smokeyj 13y ago
        > but the insinuation that OP must, by virtue of his disagreement with you, support the extreme end of this institution, is unjustified OP States: Police or FBI patrolling more efficiently seems progressive and economical. I'm not insinuating anything. I'm simply questioning OP about his self-proclaimed principles in an obviously Socratic method. The only thing I'm accusing OP of is being ignorant of principled reasoning.
w4 13y ago
I'd be inclined to agree if this were limited to public spaces only. But here's the issue: aerial surveillance isn't limited to public areas only. If I'm surveilling a public park aerially I'm also necessarily surveilling the houses next to it. If I have to get a warrant to perform that survellance then good enough. The warrant will limit the surveillance. No warrant? Now it drifts into that surveillance state place. A police officer on patrol can't police private property without trespassing; the houses bordering the park likely have privacy fences, foliage coverage, etc. to prevent their owners from being watched (by a anyone, not just police) on their pool deck or wherever. Drones (and planes) see right over those, and without warrants they're quite likely to result in privacy violations.
orblivion 13y ago
I think it comes down to something that people don't like to say outright: Many of us want the ability to evade the government. We are afraid of the government being too good at their job.
- darkxanthos 13y ago
  Exactly. That's the point I'm making in my other reply. The problem isn't that the government is watching... it's that it claims to have jurisdiction over too many issues that it shouldn't be involved in.
  - orblivion 13y ago
    Right, but my point is that there's no magic that makes the government act within its jurisdiction. We should try to force it to limit itself to that (and then some, but that's another discussion), but we shouldn't assume we'll succeed. Generally, I do agree with you. No expectation of privacy. Generally, this doesn't particularly bother me. Which means I would guess (from a very lay point of view) that there's no justification to require warrants for flying drones. Anybody should be able to fly a drone. However we should arguably be fighting against this anyway, to keep the government from being too good at its job, since we can't trust it to do the right thing with whatever power it's asserted.
    - darkxanthos 13y ago
      That's a very valid point.
- northwest 13y ago
  Government is power. And power simply must be limited. If not, there will be even more abuse, meaning: democracy will be curbed or even eliminated. And that means, general injustice will increase sharply. And this leads to a lock-in situation where injustice cannot be reversed b/c it protects itself. It's already the case to a certain degree in Washington, today, when you look to what extreme extent money is replacing democracy ("money" of course being a handful of ultra-rich people).
fargolime 13y ago
Will you feel the same when you can see (and hear) several drones in the sky at any given moment, 24/7?

northwest 13y ago

I didn't downvote you, I can't. But I think, you are seriously wrong. And it's because because you lack to see what all this will enable, abuse-wise. I'm pretty sure you will change your mind once you'll effectively feel the consequences. The thing is, if we, as a society want to advance, we need to reflect more on what is happening.

DannyBee 13y ago
I agree with you, except where you say "I'm pretty sure you will change your mind once you'll effectively feel the consequences. " No, actually, he won't. 20 years from now, when things are much worse, he won't complain then either. While what they say about boiling frogs is patently false for frogs (they will jump out), it's completely true for humans.
- northwest 13y ago
  Here you go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boiling_frog
- adestefan 13y ago
  Why do you instantly assume that 20 years from now things will be "much worse?" Even though I have no idea what "much worse" would even be.
  - fargolime 13y ago
    Why wouldn't a reasonable person assume that, given the historical trend? The gov't has been steadily implementing the strategies laid out in the book 1984, my whole longish life.
  - DannyBee 13y ago
    Please give me one time in the history of the US where privacy that was lost was later regained?

noonespecial 13y ago

I'm going to have to disagree. The possibilty that you might be observed in public is a whole different animal than the probabilty or even certainty that you will. Knowing that someone might be watching is different than being sure that someone is. And that is just where this train is headed. Edit: I'm going to go ahead and urge people not to knee-jerk downvote the parent here. Outside of a certain group of the HN crowd, I find this to be the prevailing opinion. A downvote is just a shout of "you're wrong". We need to start educating people of the consequences of ubiquitous surveillance carried to its logical end.

darkxanthos 13y ago
I appreciate the call to not down vote. I see a larger picture of things getting out of hand surely. The issue I have with drones and being watched all the time is that there are so many laws we all probably break one daily and that opens us to be treated as criminals. I'd rather have fewer laws and perhaps further increase the burden of proof necessary to bring charges.
- fargolime 13y ago
  If you see the larger picture of where things will be, why not be bothered by movement down that slippery slope?
  - darkxanthos 13y ago
    I try to focus on root causes. There's too much noise and wasted energy otherwise.
    - deleted 13y ago
      [deleted]
rdtsc 13y ago
Even more so, the constant fear of being watched changes who you are, how you act and the choices you make, even how you think. That is the whole idea behind the concept of the Panopticon. Just putting cameras that might not even work in places or put those dark glass domes like you see in the stores makes one act and feel different. There is an expectation of how police works with a given set of constraints. It seems like a _quantitative_ difference whether a police car can drive by and see your house or a police car is assigned to follow you vs small drone constantly hovering above your house or a tracking device attached to your car. Legally those are the same but they shouldn't be. The distinction is so dramatic like you put it that it is a _qualitative_ difference between the two cases, not just a matter of degree.

smokeyj 13y ago

> I get that it's being equivalted to living in a police state but I don't view it that way Largest prison population, largest military, and the end of the Fourth Amendment. I'm curious, would you support making the Gestapo more efficient at what they do?

potatolicious 13y ago
Parent poster expressed an (unpopular) opinion in a civil way. Your response purely in snark and invoking Godwin (two posts in!) is unwarranted.
- smokeyj 13y ago
  > Your response purely in snark I listed supporting arguments to the contrary.. > and invoking Godwin (two posts in!) is unwarranted I expressed an unpopular opinion in a civil way, and your response is pure snark. I didn't mean to offend you by saying the G word. Maybe I'll talk about another over-reaching police force. Would that be more palatable for you?
  - potatolicious 13y ago
    > "I listed supporting arguments to the contrary.." Yeah, and those were fine. It's like writing a great refutation and ending it with "but sure, go have tea with Hitler". The snarky "you don't support us so clearly you must support [insert evil thing]" undermines a valid point made, and verges on ad hominem. The parallels of the ubiquitous American surveillance state certainly have shades of the Stasi or the Gestapo, but the insinuation that OP must, by virtue of his disagreement with you, support the extreme end of this institution, is unjustified. He stated his opinion with civility, the accusatory, with-us-or-with-pure-evil angle is unwarranted and cheapens the discourse.
    - smokeyj 13y ago
      > but the insinuation that OP must, by virtue of his disagreement with you, support the extreme end of this institution, is unjustified OP States: Police or FBI patrolling more efficiently seems progressive and economical. I'm not insinuating anything. I'm simply questioning OP about his self-proclaimed principles in an obviously Socratic method. The only thing I'm accusing OP of is being ignorant of principled reasoning.

w4 13y ago

I'd be inclined to agree if this were limited to public spaces only. But here's the issue: aerial surveillance isn't limited to public areas only. If I'm surveilling a public park aerially I'm also necessarily surveilling the houses next to it. If I have to get a warrant to perform that survellance then good enough. The warrant will limit the surveillance. No warrant? Now it drifts into that surveillance state place. A police officer on patrol can't police private property without trespassing; the houses bordering the park likely have privacy fences, foliage coverage, etc. to prevent their owners from being watched (by a anyone, not just police) on their pool deck or wherever. Drones (and planes) see right over those, and without warrants they're quite likely to result in privacy violations.

orblivion 13y ago

I think it comes down to something that people don't like to say outright: Many of us want the ability to evade the government. We are afraid of the government being too good at their job.

darkxanthos 13y ago
Exactly. That's the point I'm making in my other reply. The problem isn't that the government is watching... it's that it claims to have jurisdiction over too many issues that it shouldn't be involved in.
- orblivion 13y ago
  Right, but my point is that there's no magic that makes the government act within its jurisdiction. We should try to force it to limit itself to that (and then some, but that's another discussion), but we shouldn't assume we'll succeed. Generally, I do agree with you. No expectation of privacy. Generally, this doesn't particularly bother me. Which means I would guess (from a very lay point of view) that there's no justification to require warrants for flying drones. Anybody should be able to fly a drone. However we should arguably be fighting against this anyway, to keep the government from being too good at its job, since we can't trust it to do the right thing with whatever power it's asserted.
  - darkxanthos 13y ago
    That's a very valid point.
northwest 13y ago
Government is power. And power simply must be limited. If not, there will be even more abuse, meaning: democracy will be curbed or even eliminated. And that means, general injustice will increase sharply. And this leads to a lock-in situation where injustice cannot be reversed b/c it protects itself. It's already the case to a certain degree in Washington, today, when you look to what extreme extent money is replacing democracy ("money" of course being a handful of ultra-rich people).

fargolime 13y ago

Will you feel the same when you can see (and hear) several drones in the sky at any given moment, 24/7?