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Now, I have been a big fan of Bruce Schneier’s work in cryptography for decades, so it pains me to say this but he’s wrong about the state of Artificial Intelligence (AI). Very, very wrong. In a recent blog post…
Expansive Freedom: The 1st Amendment Is Too Limited
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The United States has stronger restrictions on State interference in personal speech than any other country, so in that sense the 1st Amendment is doing pretty well; it’s doing a good-but-not-great job preventing press interference and an OK-but-not-good job protecting…
Let’s Be Clear: Both Sides Of The Civil War Were Wrong
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Contrary to popular belief, neither side of the U.S. Civil War was really into “freedom”. They were both fighting for the power to control other people. This tends to get skipped over in modern discussions, since the current culture war…
Identity: Telling Yourself Who You Are
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Where do you get the things that make up your own idea of who you are? And do you control what those things mean? Are you a Christian? Muslim? Scientologist? Do you support the Cowboys? The Broncos? The Raiders? Are…
You Should Read This: In Defense Of Free Speech Pedantry
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You should read this small diatribe from Ken White (aka PopeHat): In Defense Of Free Speech Pedantry. Yeah, it’s Substack, but the Internet’s in turmoil right now and sometimes even smart people make bad hosting decisions. The important part is…
Free Association: The Freedom To Discriminate
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I posted a while ago about non-discrimination laws being incompatible with freedom of conscience. Today let’s look at how they’re incompatible with freedom of association. Though, frankly, this should be obvious. Freedom of association requires that the State not be…
Followers: The Problem With “Leadership”
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Business leaders, political leaders, thought leaders; “leadership” is an aspirational word in these United States. It shouldn’t be. Sure, many of the qualities people mean by it can be good: decisiveness, confidence, charisma. These are fine things in someone trustworthy…
A Just War: Christmas Has Gone Too Far
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Thanksgiving is Ukraine to Christmas’ Russia: I wouldn’t normally be particularly interested in it, though it seems fine (if a bit problematic), but its annoying neighbor just won’t stay inside its own borders. Christmas is the expansionist wannabe empire of…
Twitpocalypse Now: An Opportunity To Improve
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You’ve probably heard that Elon Musk is having some … minor difficulties in his takeover of Twitter. Ya know, just some small things. Small things like being unable to disable access for former employees because all the employees who used…
Former: The Most Important Word In Government Titles
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The most important thing to keep in mind about having a role in the State is that it ends, and then you go home and you’re just another citizen again. This is really important. My father, with whom I agree…