Lindsey Graham came around. Sam Harris changed his point of view after a fairly combative initial stance against technologists.
We will never know if we can inform the public unless we try. There are some good analogies out there supporting encryption. Use them. I recommend the one from Sam Harris' third video on the subject. There is also the whack-a-mole argument.
Honestly, the biggest thing standing in the way of the public being informed is not the unwillingness of the public to listen. It's the technologists' unwillingness to try to educate them.
I understand your trepidation. In life, we scientists are often ignored. But sometimes we are right and I do feel if we push hard here we can figure out ways to reach people.
The technologists are constantly ignored by the populace, and major news outlets have been braying about this for years, Snowden being the most recent gigantic newsworthy event where it was in-arguably shown the united states spies on us way more than it lets on, and we should choose encryption if we value our privacy.
What is the outcome of this major revelation? Much of the public thinks no different than before in regards to government spying or encryption, and security practices are not fundamentally different even after years of media advertising what happened. Many people don't even know the significance of Snowden.
We should definitely push harder for the correct stance on encryption but I cant help and think your hope is a bit pollyannish.
How so? To me, dragnet surveillance is a lot easier to explain and conceptualize to non-techies than personal encryption. And I use encryption on all my devices (except my android phone, it's still running 4.x)
One aspect is the difference in opponent. Until recently most people thought NSA-level surveillance only applied if you were a national security threat like Osama Bin Laden.
In this case we're talking about the FBI wanting access for regular police cases. That touches way closer to reality for many.
> I cant help and think your hope is a bit pollyannish.
See, it's words like pollyannish that we shouldn't be using when engaging the public. Only kidding. But I did need to look that one up. Thanks for making me think about it. I'd say it describes me well.
If you think that is a worthless way to look at the world, then that is my problem right? What skin is it off your back?
Regardless of whether you see good in other people or not, the fact is people can and do learn about things and change their points of view. You can't point to an uninformed mass and say they are incapable of learning. En masse, yeah I agree, we can't flip a switch, but that's the way it should be. People have their own brains and should use them. We just need to present the facts about encryption in a manner that is clear for non-techies. I think there are a lot of ways to do that. If you aren't up for it, that is your decision and I support you in that.
Oh his is great! I couldn't summarize it sufficiently.
Basically, he did a complete 180.
You should listen to both his first [1] and third [2] podcast on the subject. In the first one he really lambasted supporters of encryption, and in the third he changed his view completely.
He quotes a good analogy here [3] and concludes his thoughts with a final opinion here [4]
I don't fault him for his first podcast. He came up with a reasonable point of view given the facts he understood. And when presented with new information, he changed his mind.
We ban accounts that comment like this, so please don't comment like this. Instead, comment if you have something civil and substantive to say, and not if you don't.
Lindsey Graham came around. Sam Harris changed his point of view after a fairly combative initial stance against technologists.
We will never know if we can inform the public unless we try. There are some good analogies out there supporting encryption. Use them. I recommend the one from Sam Harris' third video on the subject. There is also the whack-a-mole argument.
Honestly, the biggest thing standing in the way of the public being informed is not the unwillingness of the public to listen. It's the technologists' unwillingness to try to educate them.
I understand your trepidation. In life, we scientists are often ignored. But sometimes we are right and I do feel if we push hard here we can figure out ways to reach people.