Finally Someone Gets Privacy Right December 17
I was originally inspired to think about the whole privacy issue when I heard that David Brin argued that it was the uneven lose of privacy that was the threat not the loss of privacy itself. I didn’t bother to actually read what he had said until today but unsurprisingly he has some pretty interesting views on the subject.
What was surprising, however, was to see someone else who had a reasonable take on the whole ‘privacy’ issue, especially linked from slashdot.
While the author seems reluctant to make the leep the article flirts with the two critical points in the ‘privacy’ debate. First of all that true obscurity/freedom from recording is a lost cause and secondly that the real danger is from unequal erosion of our obscurity. So long as we only see footage of ‘crooks’ or the surveilance cameras are only placed in minority/poor neighborhoods it’s easy to use the substantial difference between what society officially designates as acceptable and how people actually behave against the most powerless parts of our society.
In the modern era most of what we do in one context (like hanging out with friends) won’t make it back to another (the office, our church). The net result of this has been to encourage endemic hypocrisy where we pretend to support the most puritanical standards while we wouldn’t dream of actually behaving that way. So long as obscurity protects our actual behavior from the prying eyes of our boss/mother/coworker/religious friend it’s much easier to affirm their moral judgments than it is to tell them we think sodomy/drugs/exhibitionism/swinging/bestiality is just fine. Thus so long as enough of us are protected from exposure those who lose their obscurity suffer greatly but if all of us are exposed then it becomes more important to avoid hypocrisy than to pretend to false virtue.
Of course the loss of obscurity only adds to the value of true privacy. When technology eliminates the difference between being on an empty street and center stage at a rock concert it will become even more important to have somewhere truly private we can retreat into. However, real privacy (actually being outside of the public view) is something that laws and technology can provide if we try hard enough.
I’m happy for anyone to see me anytime they like as long as they don’t then pass laws against things that I do that harm no one and then try to enforce them. I agree if political controls remain then it will be self containing.
On the other hand, I think there remains a danger since I expect China to become hegemon and so the political controls as we know them will be out the window.
But privacy laws and protections are truly useless if you expect the loss of democratic checks on political power. A government that doesn’t have to respond to the people can just repeal any privacy laws you like.
If you are concerned that some future non-democratic government will have access to past surveillance material I would argue that this is actually the best way to go. If you imagine we lose democratic rights via overt hostilities well no problem, just destroy records before you lose, on the other hand if you imagine a slow erosion of rights it’s much better to have a crowd of dissenters than a few publicly visible people who can be made examples of.
Anyway as far as China becoming a hegemon I doubt they will become one any more than the US is one now. Meaning that the third world countries next door to china will end up needing to do what China says but they will no more be able to tell the US, europeans or other major powers what to do anymore than the US now can tell Russia what to do.
Ultimately it is China’s fast economic growth that convinces me there is little to be concerned about militarily. People who are doing (relatively) well tend to be very opposed to going off to fight and die. There was a reason WWII happened after the economic disaster that was inflicted on Germany after WWI.
Yes you are right regarding the first part.
Regarding the second
I think the Chinese are generally very rational, and won’t do anything stupid. Although if the US looks to be irrational then taking some action to neutralize the threat would be a smart move for them (and possibly everyone).
Also the nature of the changeover (looking at the current situation) would seem to involve the US overspending and thus effectively owing the Chinese a massive debt – the Chinese then get forced to prop up the US economy (and dollar) – like a huge IMF loan with a high likelihood of it never being repaid. Something for which surely they would want some influence in exchange (even if only to put them in a good spot to prevent the US getting ‘depression madness’ like germany did).
But for the most part, I see the influence in part being how china would want international structured to be designed (i.e. their direct influence) but also things like what universities lead the debate on issues, what market is the main market for media etc. Effecting things like whether people are fed a diet of the importance of individualism or collectivism and what sorts of ideas will tend to emerge or be attacked and what sort of things carry even a vague threat of a political or economic sanction.