I think democracy is more of a levy to capitalism than an accelerator: democracy, thus far, has happened to help capitalism, but that's because democracies are overwhelmingly not democratic even in the representative sense. The people there come from money and so vote for things that help thems, like all humans do. (this is a big problem for representative democracy: since humans vote for themselves, by human nature, you can't build representative systems since the apes that get the office are no better than the apes at home, and will vote for themselves)
But if you build in more steps for scrutiny then this gets tampered as the individual decision becomes collective. — Moliere
Can you lay out a case? — Moliere
My thought is that as soon as you're "the representative" then, in the material sense of being-able, you're no longer the same as whom you represent. (one of the mechanisms of syndicalism is that representatives cannot re-present, so a new person has to go up to say what the people they represent think every time, whatever that "time" happens to be designated as) — Moliere
The custodes custodorum problem is fraught with infinite regress and is therefore fundamentally unsolvable. — Tarskian
In spite of being the most comfortable humans in history, there's a loss of faith in democracy. — frank
Authoritarianism has become appealing for a reason, right? — frank
When something is working so relatively well, folk can just take it for granted. Then as things start to go wrong, it can take those who have become disconnected from the realities quite some time to understand why. — apokrisis
Or I was thinking it might be a problem with aggression during peacetime. We turn on each other. — frank
That's true. But I was also thinking of the political influence wealth can have indirectly, not by influencing politicians. Where does that new factory go? Who going to be laid off? Where am I going to put my money? That sort of thing. Money talks. To put it another way, "it's all about economics, stupid" — Ludwig V
Corruption only needs to be kept within tolerable bounds. — apokrisis
The average strength of the wall of a besieged city does not matter. Only the weakest spot does. — Tarskian
You can indeed use statistical calculations to control the damage caused by hurricanes. You cannot do that, however, when it is about human adversaries. — Tarskian
Human attackers of course understand the principle from its other side. And that is what drives the hierarchical complexity. — apokrisis
More statistical theory might help you on how effective solutions are good enough. You don’t need exact precision. — apokrisis
In less than three years, Klyushin’s cybersecurity scam amassed more than $93 million.
https://www.justice.gov/usao-ma/pr/russian-businessman-found-guilty-90-million-hack-trade-conspiracy
Trial evidence showed that, between at least in or about January 2018 and September 2020, Klyushin, and allegedly Ermakov, Irzak, Sladkov and Rumiantcev, conspired to use stolen earnings information to trade in the securities of companies that are publicly traded on U.S. national securities exchanges, including the NASDAQ and the NYSE, in advance of public earnings announcements. Using the same malicious hacking techniques M-13 advertised to customers, Klyushin and, allegedly his co-conspirators, obtained inside information by hacking into the computer networks of two U.S.-based filing agents that publicly-traded companies used to make quarterly and annual filings through the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).
Armed with this information before it was disclosed to the public, Klyushin, and allegedly his co-conspirators, knew ahead of time, among other things, whether a company’s financial performance would meet, exceed or fall short of market expectations – and thus whether its share price would likely rise or fall following the public earnings announcement. Klyushin then traded based on that stolen information in brokerage accounts held in his own name and in the names of others.
You cannot protect a system from attackers who seek to exploit its vulnerabilities by means of statistically good enough solutions. It won't work. — Tarskian
No amount of hierarchical complexity can seal off this kind of vulnerabilities from attack. — Tarskian
In less than three years, Klyushin’s cybersecurity scam amassed more than $93 million.
In fact, it is enough that just one low-ranking bureaucrat, who is apparently just some seemingly unimportant cog in the system, leaks the wrong information to the adversary, for corruption to start snow balling. You can imagine the damage if people higher up the ladder decide to start making money from their power, and they routinely do. — Tarskian
Driving your car causes inevitable wear and tear. — apokrisis
You are being a perfectionist in a world where averageness is quite good enough as a baseline for action. — apokrisis
Nonetheless, in practice, it seems to last a lot better than political power. — Ludwig V
Formally, the elliptic curve discrete logarithm problem (ECDLP) is the problem of finding an integer value e within the bounds of 1 and the number of points on the elliptic curve (which ~= the order of the finite cyclic group), such that the scalar multiplication of a primitive element G with e, i.e. eG, produces another point P on the elliptic curve.
... unless you are a fraudster!It's not just a press of the button to take your coins away from you. — Tarskian
What is true freedom?Seizure-prone wealth is a form of slavery. It is not true freedom. — Tarskian
Total trust in everyone is idiotic. Total distrust of everyone makes life impossible. The trick is, to know how far you can trust each person. You seem to trust Bitcoin.I trust that ultimately the true consensus will be to distrust. — Tarskian
unless you are a fraudster! — Ludwig V
What is true freedom? — Ludwig V
You seem to trust Bitcoin. — Ludwig V
It's certainly a protection in a different league. So I'm not saying you are wrong to trust it. How does that square with your policy of distrust?It's based on a collection of math/cryptographic theories, that I investigated -- starting in 2013 -- and that are not easy to refute. Well, I am still waiting for someone to successfully do that. If someone really can, he will probably become a trillionaire. — Tarskian
Some people regard those as very restricting.I define true (or maximum) freedom as keeping just the laws of God. — Tarskian
I'm sure you're not. They might be watching. Anyway, that's the policy that most people go for, isn't it?The local ruling mafia is actually a quite manageable problem. I am certainly not complaining. — Tarskian
It's certainly a protection in a different league. So I'm not saying you are wrong to trust it. How does that square with your policy of distrust? — Ludwig V
Some people regard those as very restricting. — Ludwig V
I'm sure you're not. They might be watching. — Ludwig V
I'm really sorry, but the fact is that I have had many firm reassurances that IT is absolutely, finally secure, only to discover that it isn't. So I'm not buying.I would have to distrust the math/cryptography. In fact, mathematicians and cryptographers generally do. That is why they invariably demand proof and then scrutinize it thoroughly. The method itself is already one of systematic distrust. — Tarskian
H'm. Perhaps self-discipline is freedom. An interesting thought.They are mostly a matter of self-discipline. — Tarskian
So you know how far to trust them? Or do you just think you know? Put a foot wrong and you might become an object of great political interest.However, that is typically not what any local ruling mafia is interested in. They have other politically more interesting people on their radar as well as limited resources to watch them. — Tarskian
I'm really sorry, but the fact is that I have had many firm reassurances that IT is absolutely, finally secure, only to discover that it isn't. — Ludwig V
So you know how far to trust them? Or do you just think you know? Put a foot wrong and you might become an object of great political interest. — Ludwig V
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