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by jackson1442 1233 days ago
Agreed. A better question- how can we build a government which we can trust with unprecedented levels of centralized information?

The centralization of information is going to happen one way or another (the powers that be wouldn't have it any other way), and we've already been on this trajectory. So how can we build a system that actually respects privacy and upholds the common good?

4 comments

That's a dumb question, sorry. We can't. That's why government's powers and role are constitutionally limited, and why the explicit limitations (even though the government is not supposed to have any powers other than those explicitly given to it) need to be updated as technology changes. The idea that we could build a government we can trust is absurd. It's equivalent to suggesting we could build a police force that can monitor everything we do, but will have some kind of structure that makes it not abuse that power. It's not even wrong, it's too ridiculous to even give the time of day to
>> respects privacy and upholds the common good?

That's not how consolidation of power by a government works.

You decentralize the government. The result might not be much better on average, but then at least people who believe that privacy is a common good can find a space for themselves and be left alone by the rest.
>> The centralization of information is going to happen one way or another

This is not necessarily the case, thanks to encryption, which plays on the side of the weak. A weak can encrypt data that a strong can never decrypt.

Encryption can be banned or otherwise regulated. While it wouldn't prevent people "with something to hide" from using encryption regardless, it would deter most regular people, which is good enough from the government perspective for the purposes of this exercise.
> a strong can never decrypt

Is "a weak" using an encryption random number generator that was designed by "a weak" or "a strong"?

One can generate one's private keys by physically rolling dice and choosing words, thus avoiding the problem of rigged random number generators. The government still doesn't control physics (or economic laws, come to think of it!).
> physically rolling dice

Thanks for the reminder to buy (in person) and secure dice against physical tampering!