Reasons for hacking DSOs

[G0HZU]

kcbrown: This doesn't follow.  Monarchs are not subject to the law except voluntarily, because monarchs make the law (generally.  There have been systems where the law was made by a parliamentary body, and the monarch was symbolic only, but those are irrelevant to this discussion).  Name one monarch who was removed because he violated the law.

Not sure what you mean by removed. If you mean name a monarch who had their 'head' removed then you could include Charles the 1st or Mary Queen of Scots or Lady Jane Grey. They were tried and executed for treason about 500 years ago.

kcbrown:  Monarchs are not subject to the law except voluntarily

I doubt they volunteered for this...

[kcbrown]

Again, I'm not arguing for lawlessness.  A minimum set of laws is necessary to ensure that liberty is retained by the people, that it is not removed through coercion by other people, and so that people who intentionally harm others are removed from our midst.

So ... there should be no laws against public drunkenness,

Nope, there shouldn't be.  Who is being harmed by someone being drunk in public?

But if someone who is drunk does something harmful, then they are responsible for that.  Their drunken state is immaterial to that.

dangerous driving,

Same as being drunk in public.

Why do we bother to make exceptions for these things?  If you do something harmful to someone else, you own the responsibility for it.  Are you going to insist that we have a law against every possible thing that might put someone else in danger?  Are you going to insist that we must live in a world free of risk from the actions of others?   To live is to risk, and to live with others is to risk being inadvertently harmed by others.  It has always been that way, and no amount of laws will stop it.

gambling,

Gambling?  Seriously?  That is most certainly something that should not be illegal.  If someone wants to throw away their money on a foolish game, why should we tell them they can't?   Are you going to also prevent "investing" in the stock market?  That, too, is gambling -- it's just less obvious.

etc. Building codes are a waste of time,

These days, many building codes are a waste of time.  What matters there is not the building code, but rather complete and honest representation during the sale.  If I want to build my own home in some certain way, who is anyone to tell me I can't?  Why should they have any say in the matter whatsoever?  We're talking about something I'm doing on my own property that isn't harming anyone else.  But if I misrepresent what I'm selling to someone else, either directly or by omission, such that what they're getting is less than what I have represented it to be, then I have harmed them and am responsible for it.

so are environmental laws.

You own what you do.  If you want to dump garbage onto your property, that's your right.  But if there's any runoff from that, any leakage, or anything else (including odors) that intrudes upon someone else's property, then you have brought harm to that other person, if only because you have done something to their property that they didn't authorize.

See a tree? Cut it down. Nobody was harmed. Who cares if I go out and dump my trash in the country? Nobody lives there. When I go out I should be able to shoot all the animals, too. I enjoy doing that.

And if you do all of those things on your own property, such that in doing so you don't affect anyone else's property or harm anyone else, then knock yourself out.  Who is anyone to tell you otherwise?  Why should they have authority over what you do with your own things as long as what you do doesn't harm them?

But if you're talking about someone doing those things on someone else's property without authorization, that's a very different thing.

So what if my car is old and needs new tires? It gets me where I'm going.

What of it?  If your car is old and needs new tires, and you refuse to replace them and as a result you cause harm to someone else, then you own the consequences of that just as surely as if you had intentionally harmed them (it's actually in between intentional harm and unintentional harm -- you didn't intentionally take an action to harm someone else, but you intentionally made a decision that was the deciding factor in the harm that resulted). 

We have laws against such things already.  One example is called "involuntary manslaughter".

If you end up harming only yourself as a result, well, you have nobody but yourself to blame.

I always drive carefully so why do I need car insurance?

Why indeed?  By driving on the roads, you take the risk that someone else will hit you.  If they do, it's their responsibility to make amends.  That is already the case right now.  If someone hits you accidentally, then it's on them to make amends as best as they can, and the rest is on you because you knowingly took the risk of driving in public in the first place.  If someone hits you intentionally, then that's assault, and the longstanding laws already deal with it.



See a pattern here yet?  All of these laws you bring up are unnecessary.  The longstanding laws that have been on the books for centuries are more than adequate to deal with it.  There are some exceptions to that (e.g., emission laws, and some laws that govern shared resources), as there are with anything, but the bulk of the laws we have on the books appear unnecessary.

And how do we know they're unnecessary?  Simple: because we managed to survive without them, and quite well at that, before they were passed, and they don't address something that was suddenly so new, so different, and so harmful that it demanded a new law.  No, these laws were passed because someone noticed that something "could be made better or safer than it already is".  Not, generally, because of the invention of some new magic type of harm that didn't previously exist.

I'll ask you plainly: at what point are you going to believe that we have enough laws?  Are we already there?  If so, then why aren't you advocating for a shutdown of the lawmaking bodies?  If not, then when does it ever end?  If "never", then it follows that liberty will continue to be extinguished until someone with sufficient influence has had it, and overthrows the existing regime through immense violence.  That is, after all, exactly what has happened historically.


Do you want to avoid the inevitable violent confrontation that will result if we keep extinguishing liberty, or not?

[kcbrown]

kcbrown: This doesn't follow.  Monarchs are not subject to the law except voluntarily, because monarchs make the law (generally.  There have been systems where the law was made by a parliamentary body, and the monarch was symbolic only, but those are irrelevant to this discussion).  Name one monarch who was removed because he violated the law.

Not sure what you mean by removed.

As in, forced to abandon their position as a result of being arrested, put through the same legal process that already existed and which is used for all others, and convicted of violating one or more laws that were already in effect that they imposed upon others, under the very same system that they were in power over.   Because the claim is, after all, that these people are operating under the same law that they administered over everyone else (really, that it is the law itself that keeps them in check).  If that's the case, then there should be examples of these people being arrested and jailed just like the rest of us mere mortals would be, for violations of the same laws that the rest of us mere mortals are arrested and jailed for.

If you mean name a monarch who had their 'head' removed then you could include Charles the 1st

Yep, that counts.  It's actually a decent example in support of what tggzzz was saying, but it is muted somewhat by the fact that the monarch wasn't the lawmaking entity in that government, an exception I noted (though here, Charles had more than mere symbolic power).  In this case, Charles intentionally took up arms against that very lawmaking arm.

or Mary Queen of Scots

This, I'm not sure about.  I can't tell if she was actually monarch over the country that she was executed in.  Looks like it was hotly contested, at the very least.

or Lady Jane Grey. They were tried and executed for treason about 500 years ago.

This seems even stranger (and weaker) than Mary's case.  It looks entirely political, with no actual justification for the charge.

Regardless, those latter two executions seem to have been political in nature, rather than due to actual violation of the law.   


The invocation of some law after the fact to "justify" the removal of a monarch for political purposes isn't exactly evidence that it is the law that keeps monarchs in check.  There, it is not the law that caused removal of the monarch, it is the political desires of others who gained an upper hand.

kcbrown:  Monarchs are not subject to the law except voluntarily

I doubt they volunteered for this...

True, that.

The Charles I example is a very good one, actually.  I guess it goes to show there are exceptions to just about everything. 

Regardless, it appears to be incredibly rare (if ever) that monarchs are held to all of the same laws that everyone else is, thus rendering the claim that monarchs are held in check by the laws themselves (as opposed to through political wrangling) a questionable one at best.

[Brumby]

Oh, angels and saints preserve us!

Again, I'm not arguing for lawlessness.  A minimum set of laws is necessary to ensure that liberty is retained by the people, that it is not removed through coercion by other people, and so that people who intentionally harm others are removed from our midst.

So ... there should be no laws against public drunkenness,

Nope, there shouldn't be.  Who is being harmed by someone being drunk in public?

But if someone who is drunk does something harmful, then they are responsible for that.  Their drunken state is immaterial to that.

Aside from the fact that it is all too often the CAUSE of them doing something harmful.


Why not apply the same logic to drink driving?  They haven't killed anyone until they do - so let's not impede their right to drive ... and just hold them accountable should they happen to end someone's life.  Same logic.  Identical logic.  The only difference is risk factor.  (That hasn't been relevant to the discussion to this point - but watch it appear now...)



This thread has descended to absurdity.  Argument for the sake of argument.  It makes inane rhetoric look like Wisdom of the Ages.

[Fungus]

gambling,

Gambling?  Seriously?  That is most certainly something that should not be illegal.  If someone wants to throw away their money on a foolish game, why should we tell them they can't?

a) There's people that will invent games that look like you can win.
b) They might have families who need food. It harms them (should we throw the gambler in jail for harming them?)

etc.

so are environmental laws.

You own what you do.  If you want to dump garbage onto your property, that's your right.  But if there's any runoff from that, any leakage, or anything else (including odors) that intrudes upon someone else's property, then you have brought harm to that other person, if only because you have done something to their property that they didn't authorize.

And...locking you up will instantly fix the ground water (or whatever), right?

You seem to be assuming that everybody knows the consequences of what they do. All those people up there in the woods are chemists, physicists and statisticians. They know exactly what's happening in that pile of sludge they're creating.

    See a tree? Cut it down. Nobody was harmed. Who cares if I go out and dump my trash in the country? Nobody lives there. When I go out I should be able to shoot all the animals, too. I enjoy doing that.

And if you do all of those things on your own property, such that in doing so you don't affect anyone else's property or harm anyone else, then knock yourself out.  Who is anyone to tell you otherwise?  Why should they have authority over what you do with your own things as long as what you do doesn't harm them?

I buy a house, rape the land for profit. Buy another house, do the same...

It's easier than working and who cares if houses aren't infinite, I've got beer!

I always drive carefully so why do I need car insurance?

Why indeed?  By driving on the roads, you take the risk that someone else will hit you.  If they do, it's their responsibility to make amends.

By unkilling your wife and children? My next-door neighbor was in a crash where his wife and one of his kids died. He ended up pretty bad himself, with spinal injuries. The other driver was over twice the drink-drive limit and speeding.

Yes, the other guy did to jail. He probably felt bad about what he'd done, too, but... did that fix anything? 


I'm not going to refute you one by one, It's obvious you don't get it.

[kcbrown]

Same as being drunk in public.

Why do we bother to make exceptions for these things?

a) Statistics
b) Locking somebody up won't bring back the family he/she wiped out

Locking someone up won't bring back the family he/she wiped out whether or not it is made illegal.  Otherwise, you have to explain to all the people who died at the hands of bad guys how the law against what the bad guys did helped them to not be dead.

The law's main purpose is make it possible to justly remove people who would harm us from our midst.

As for statistics, well, now you're left with having to answer how one statistical risk cutoff is better than some other one, when the people who make these laws generally don't know the first thing about statistics to begin with.

Gambling?  Seriously?  That is most certainly something that should not be illegal.  If someone wants to throw away their money on a foolish game, why should we tell them they can't?

a) There's people that will invent games that look like you can win.

Then, if you insist on making anything illegal at all, you should make illegal the creation of games that falsely advertise how "winnable" they are.  Or make the false advertising itself illegal.

So again, why should we make gambling itself illegal?

b) They might have families who need food. It harms them (should we throw the gambler in jail for harming them?)

Let me get this straight.  You think it's a good idea to create laws that prevent people from spending their money foolishly in case their families suffer for their bad choices?

Rather big can of worms you're opening up there.  Sure you want to go down that road?

Are you going to also prevent "investing" in the stock market?  That, too, is gambling -- it's just less obvious.

Maybe it should be more regulated. People who "invest" usually aren't doing it with welfare checks, etc.

How does it matter what money they're using to do it with?  If you really insist on controlling the use of welfare checks, then control that directly.  After all, welfare checks are money forcibly transferred at gunpoint from people who pay taxes to people who claim to need it.  (That's not to say I don't believe in the usefulness of such a safety net.  But if someone is going to be paid money by the government, they should be doing work in exchange for it).

You own what you do.  If you want to dump garbage onto your property, that's your right.  But if there's any runoff from that, any leakage, or anything else (including odors) that intrudes upon someone else's property, then you have brought harm to that other person, if only because you have done something to their property that they didn't authorize.

And...locking you up will immediately fix the ground water (or whatever), right?

Nope.  Nor will the imposition of environmental laws.  Laws only control what happens to someone after the damage is done.  Some laws may make it easier to catch the damage earlier, and some laws may actually sway people from doing things that they don't otherwise know are harmful, but if people are interested in not causing harm, they don't need a law to tell them how!  If people can look up laws, they can look up other things.  And if people violate the law and cause harm as a result, the harm is already done anyway.

If you really want people to know these things, then make them part of the school curriculum, so that everyone knows about it.

Also, you assume everybody knows the consequences of what they do. All those people up there in the woods are chemists, physicists and statisticians. They know exactly what's happening in that pile of sludge they're creating.

No, I assume that people will act on the basis of what they know, and that includes knowledge of the law itself.  Whether the dangers are made plain through the law or through education, the end result is the same: those who have the knowledge will avoid taking the dangerous actions unless they don't care (in which case the law doesn't matter), while those who don't have the knowledge will take the action whether or not it is illegal.

And if you do all of those things on your own property, such that in doing so you don't affect anyone else's property or harm anyone else, then knock yourself out.  Who is anyone to tell you otherwise?  Why should they have authority over what you do with your own things as long as what you do doesn't harm them?

So... I buy a house, rape the land for profit. Buy another house, do the same...

It's easier than working and who cares if houses aren't infinite so long as I've got enough beer?

You can rape the land for profit.  But if the person who buys it from you finds out that you misrepresented it either by omission or directly, then you're in trouble.  If you want to take that risk, that's up to you.

Oh, you're raping the land and you actually tell the person you're selling the land to about it?  Now you've compromised the value of your land and the amount you'll be able to sell it for will reflect that, unless you're selling it to someone who doesn't care about that, in which case who is anyone else to say that you've damaged the "value" of your land?

I always drive carefully so why do I need car insurance?

Why indeed?  By driving on the roads, you take the risk that someone else will hit you.  If they do, it's their responsibility to make amends.

By unkilling your wife and children? My next-door neighbor was in a crash where his wife and one of his kids died. He ended up pretty bad himself, with spinal injuries. The other driver was speeding and over twice the drink-drive limit.

And having car insurance helps to bring back your wife and children how, again?

I'm really sorry to hear about what happened to your next door neighbor.  That's just horrible. 

Wanna tell me how the laws against drunk driving prevented what happened to him, and caused his wife and kid to be alive now?  Oh, that's right, they didn't.

You're not exactly making a good case here (but see below).

So we put the other guy in jail, and... then what? 

What then indeed?  Life is risk.  And we all die, one way or the other.  If you really don't want to take the risk, then don't drive in the first place.  Take public transportation or something.  Your quality of life will suffer as a result, but at least you'll be alive, right?

I'm not going to refute you one by one, It's obvious you don't get it.

You're right, I don't.  I don't get why we have to have laws that generally do nothing but have the effect of making something that's already illegal "more illegal" by forbidding something that is not itself harmful.  Put another way, I don't see the point in victimless crimes.  That strikes me as a major abuse of power.

Now, I can't deny that the drunk driving laws have probably had a noticeable effect on driving fatalities.  MADD's site shows a decline of drunk driving deaths from 21,113 in 1982 to 9,967 in 2014.  During that same period, total traffic deaths went from 43,945 to 32,675.  The latter's fraction of the population went from 19 per 100K to about 10 per 100K.

Was it worth it?  Perhaps.  How much of that is due to the laws, and how much is due to greater recognition of the problem, education, etc.?  I don't know how to go about separating out those effects.  And I don't know how much has been spent on enforcement that might have been better spent on going after guys who are out to intentionally harm people.

One other thing: the roads are a shared resource.  Laws governing their use are a necessity regardless, so I don't have nearly the objection to drunk driving laws as I do to laws that govern what you can do on your own property.


So again I ask: where does it end?  Do you truly want to face the inevitable violent conflict that will result if people's liberties keep getting taken away from them?

[Fungus]

You're right, I don't.

Obviously.

OK, let's go back to the "building code" laws...which are obvious to you.

The problem about "not misrepresenting" is that you assume the buyer understands the risks being represented by the seller. In many (most?) cases they don't, they just see "it's cheap!".

Similarly drunk drivers. They don't know the risks. They don't read drunk driving statistics and they all assume they're incredibly good drivers so they'll be fine (it's only the idiot drivers who shouldn't drink, not them).

Your argument assumes perfect education, perfect knowledge, perfect risk assessment by everybody. Real life experience has shown this isn't the case. The risks they take are far higher that the paybacks, hence laws.

You think you're perfectly informed? I bet I can come up with gambling games that look like you can always win.

Here's an easy one: You make a bet and throw three dice. If you get one six I give you your money back. If you get two sixes I give you five times your money. If you get three sixes I give you ten times your money.

Wanna play? 

(Clue: The house makes about 25% profit on that game)


Second: If nothing else, laws specify the punishments. How would you judge people's responsibility for their damages without any written guidelines?

eg. Is drunk driving worse than selling an unsafe house? How much punishment is appropriate for each? Surely you need a written code for that.

[kcbrown]

You're right, I don't.

Obviously.

OK, let's go back to the "building code" laws...which are obvious to you.

The problem about "not misrepresenting" is that you assume the buyer understands the risks being represented by the seller. In many (most?) cases they don't, they just see "it's cheap!".

If ignorance of the law is no excuse, then how can we simultaneously insist with a straight face that ignorance of what you're intentionally paying money for is?

This gets us to the entire notion of "due diligence".  Are you going to insist that someone who buys an oscilloscope because "it's cheap!" but which doesn't meet his needs is somehow wronged in the transaction when the capabilities of the thing were made available ahead of time?  Really?

Similarly drunk drivers. They don't know the risks. They don't read drunk driving statistics and they all assume they're incredibly good drivers so they'll be fine (it's only the idiot drivers who shouldn't drink, not them).

"They don't know the risks".  Really?   If it's just an education problem, then do the education and be done with it.  That's what schools are for.

If it's more than an education problem, then address that as well.  But put the law in only if all your other efforts have failed and you're left with no choice, and the problem is so bad that it really demands taking away people's liberty.

Your argument assumes perfect education, perfect knowledge, perfect risk assessment by everybody. Real life experience has shown this isn't the case. The risks they take are far higher that the paybacks, hence laws.

That's the nature of risk, though.  You're talking as if you expect the law to coddle us, to protect us from that evil, bad world, and to make it so that only the risks that have a net beneficial risk:reward ratio are the ones we take.

Do that, and you end up with everyone living in a padded room.

You think you're perfectly informed? I bet I can come up with gambling games that look like you can always win.

Maybe you could.  But this reveals a legitimate role of government: to make such things plain.  If we as a society are so concerned about people not being informed, then the proper remedy is to deal with the lack of information, not to forbid actions that are harmful only to those who take those actions (and, sometimes, those they are responsible for.  That's the very nature of responsibility for others: the risks you take are distributed to those you're responsible for).

Here's an easy one: You make a bet and throw three dice. If you get one six I give you your money back. If you get two sixes I give you five times your money. If you get three sixes I give you ten times your money.

Wanna play? 

Lessee ... assuming 6 sided dice (you didn't specify the size, so these figures are the best possible case for me) I have a probability of gaining 5x of 1/72 (3/216), a probability of gaining 10x of 1/216, and a probability of losing nothing of 1/72 (3/216).  The rest (209/216) is a loss of 1x.  So that works out to a probability of winning at all of 1/54 (4/216), with the average winning in that case being 6.25x ((5 * 3 + 10) / 4).

Looks to me like the weights are such that I will lose roughly 85% ((25 - 209) / 216) on average.

(Clue: The house makes about 25% profit on that game)

Looks to me like the house has a much greater advantage than that.

Second: If nothing else, laws specify the punishments. How would you judge people's responsibility for their damages without any written guidelines? Is drunk driving worse than selling an unsafe house? How much punishment is appropriate for each? 

You mean kinda like how judges or juries have to decide damages when one person sues another?   There's one answer.  But I have no problem with the law specifying penalty guidelines for different types of acts of harm (in fact, that's one of the main functions of the law).  The key here, however, is that there must be actual harm (or the law must govern the use of a shared resource, as the law against drunk driving does).

[Fungus]

"They don't know the risks".  Really?

No, they mis-judge the risks. Not the same thing at all.

"They don't know the risks".  Really?   If it's just an education problem, then do the education and be done with it.  That's what schools are for.

I'd like to put you in a classroom for a couple of weeks. See how much "education" you can impart.

Here's an easy one: You make a bet and throw three dice. If you get one six I give you your money back. If you get two sixes I give you five times your money. If you get three sixes I give you ten times your money.

Wanna play? 

Lessee ... assuming 6 sided dice (you didn't specify the size,

(yes, I mean six-sided dice - ordinary ones)

so these figures are the best possible case for me) I have a probability of gaining 5x of 1/72 (3/216), a probability of gaining 10x of 1/216, and a probability of losing nothing of 1/72 (3/216).  The rest (209/216) is a loss of 1x.  So that works out to a probability of winning at all of 1/54 (4/216), with the average winning in that case being 6.25x ((5 * 3 + 10) / 4).

Looks to me like the weights are such that I will lose roughly 85% ((25 - 209) / 216) on average.

Ummm.... that answer fails even the common sense check. 

Think: What's the chance of rolling a six with a single die? 16.6% (1/6), right?

I've given you three dice to play with so your chances are three times better than with a single die, much higher than the 15% in your math.

You mean kinda like how judges or juries have to decide damages when one person sues another?   There's one answer.  But I have no problem with the law specifying penalty guidelines for different types of acts of harm (in fact, that's one of the main functions of the law).

And then you need to hire a police force to go after the bad people, jails to put them in, courts to try them... and it's not really much different than what we have now.

The key here, however, is that there must be actual harm (or the law must govern the use of a shared resource, as the law against drunk driving does).

So... it's completely acceptable to drive drunk though the middle of town at 100mph, so long as you don't hit anything?

And you can just drive away if you do it at night when there's nobody around to see who it was?

Uhuh.

[rsjsouza]

See a pattern here yet?  All of these laws you bring up are unnecessary.  The longstanding laws that have been on the books for centuries are more than adequate to deal with it.  There are some exceptions to that (e.g., emission laws, and some laws that govern shared resources), as there are with anything, but the bulk of the laws we have on the books appear unnecessary.

And how do we know they're unnecessary?  Simple: because we managed to survive without them, and quite well at that, before they were passed, and they don't address something that was suddenly so new, so different, and so harmful that it demanded a new law.  No, these laws were passed because someone noticed that something "could be made better or safer than it already is".  Not, generally, because of the invention of some new magic type of harm that didn't previously exist.

Yeah, right.  Modern societies don't work like that (excluding the exceptions where the state crumbled and gave way to militias/paramilitary rulers). Liberties are not clipped until someone screws up badly and then society starts discussing how to address/restrict that. Anyone could drive as fast as they could until "uncle Bob" caused a big wreck and speed limits were enforced. Anyone could drink as much as they could until "uncle Bob's gang" thrashed a place or assassinated or raped someone until drinking limits started to be discussed/enforced. Anyone could carry a gun anywhere until some kids started shooting their peers in school and this started a whole slew of discussion in the US (and worldwide).

[Fungus]

Yeah, right.  Modern societies don't work like that (excluding the exceptions where the state crumbled and gave way to militias/paramilitary rulers). Liberties are not clipped until someone screws up badly and then society starts discussing how to address/restrict that.

Yep. I don't believe there's many people sitting around in offices just thinking of liberties to take away for no particular reason.

[kcbrown]

"They don't know the risks".  Really?

No, they mis-judge the risks. Not the same thing at all.

And you think that legislators are any better at that?

"They don't know the risks".  Really?   If it's just an education problem, then do the education and be done with it.  That's what schools are for.

I'd like to put you in a classroom for a couple of weeks. See how much "education" you can impart.

If it's the school curriculum, then you have far longer than that to get the job done.

so these figures are the best possible case for me) I have a probability of gaining 5x of 1/72 (3/216), a probability of gaining 10x of 1/216, and a probability of losing nothing of 1/72 (3/216).  The rest (209/216) is a loss of 1x.  So that works out to a probability of winning at all of 1/54 (4/216), with the average winning in that case being 6.25x ((5 * 3 + 10) / 4).

Looks to me like the weights are such that I will lose roughly 85% ((25 - 209) / 216) on average.

Ummm.... that answer fails even the common sense check. 

Which is why I knew I should have waited until the morning before posting it -- so my brain wouldn't be completely nonfunctional.   

The chance for losing nothing is 75 / 216 (3 * 5 * 5 / 216).  The chance for gaining 5x is 15 / 216 (3 * 5 / 216).  The chance for gaining 10x is 1/216.  Which means the chance of losing is (216 - 75 - 15 - 1) / 216 = 125 / 216.  With weighting, that gives me ((85 - 125) / 216), or a loss of about 19%.

Think: What's the chance of rolling a six with a single die? 16.6% (1/6), right?

I've given you three dice to play with so your chances are three times better than with a single die, much higher than the 15% in your math.

Remind me not to attempt to do statistics right before I go to sleep.       

You mean kinda like how judges or juries have to decide damages when one person sues another?   There's one answer.  But I have no problem with the law specifying penalty guidelines for different types of acts of harm (in fact, that's one of the main functions of the law).

And then you need to hire a police force to go after the bad people, jails to put them in, courts to try them... and it's not really much different than what we have now.

Right.  You seem to think I'm advocating doing away with the entire infrastructure, which isn't the case at all.

The difference wouldn't be in the infrastructure, it would be in what actions one could legally take.

The key here, however, is that there must be actual harm (or the law must govern the use of a shared resource, as the law against drunk driving does).

So... it's completely acceptable to drive drunk though the middle of town at 100mph, so long as you don't hit anything?

Ignoring for the moment that laws governing shared resources are an exception to the general approach I'm talking about, basically, yes.  No harm, no foul.

If you start to forbid actions merely because they might bring harm to someone, then where does it end?  When do you decide enough is enough?  When someone gets so fed up with it that they overthrow the government?

And you can just drive away if you do it at night when there's nobody around to see who it was?

You mean, like you can already?

The law just imposes penalties on performing certain actions.  Those penalties clearly don't come into effect if nobody sees you perform the actions.

[Zero999]

Ignoring for the moment that laws governing shared resources are an exception to the general approach I'm talking about, basically, yes.  No harm, no foul.

Whilst I agree that the legal system needs to be simplified, there is a need for laws against behaviours which pose a high risk to others.

Suppose someone gets caught drink driving at 100mph? Even though they haven't harmed anyone, they're banned from driving, dealt a hefty fine and a prison sentence. Now you may see this as unfair as no one was harmed due to their actions but by taking them off the road they won't do it again (at least for awhile), which will prevent them from harming anyone else.

I'm quite sure the family of someone who was killed when they were hit by a drunk driver would be extremely angry with the police, if the driver had previously been caught for drink driving on numerous occasions, yet it went unpunished and they kept doing it. If they were imprisoned before, then a life would have been saved.

Building regulations are not only for the benefit of the owner but for the nearby properties too and when they don't exist then bad things happen, such as in the Great Fire of London.

[timb]

Building codes also serve to protect people in public buildings, like offices, hospitals, government buildings, hotels, apartments etc.

I don't know about you, but I wouldn't get in an elevator if there weren't laws governing maintenance and mandatory safety features (the Otis brake, etc.), would you?

The reasons for having building codes on private residences goes deeper, too. Unless you built your house yourself, with no outside help, you have no way of absolutely guaranteeing things were done right. You wouldn't even know what to look for! That's the point of building inspectors. If a contractor can save money by cutting corners, he will. You need someone to make sure that the wiring is up to spec, for example. Because once the walls go up, it's not something I can easily verify.

That said, some places do take it to extremes. I heard that in Oz, you can't even replace a light switch or receptacle yourself. You have to get a certified electrician to do it. That's insane.

[Fungus]

The chance for losing nothing is 75 / 216 (3 * 5 * 5 / 216).  The chance for gaining 5x is 15 / 216 (3 * 5 / 216).  The chance for gaining 10x is 1/216.  Which means the chance of losing is (216 - 75 - 15 - 1) / 216 = 125 / 216.  With weighting, that gives me ((85 - 125) / 216), or a loss of about 19%.

Nope.

[Brumby]

That said, some places do take it to extremes. I heard that in Oz, you can't even replace a light switch or receptacle yourself. You have to get a certified electrician to do it. That's insane.

Whether it's insane or not is debatable.  I've seen some people that make me nervous when changing a light globe ... but the statement is correct.  Only a licenced electrician is legally permitted to work on any fixed wiring.  It goes a step further, too.... if an electrician does work on somebody else's building, they must hold an electrical contractor's licence, or be employed by someone who does.  IIRC, they are, however, permitted to work on their own home.

[timb]

That said, some places do take it to extremes. I heard that in Oz, you can't even replace a light switch or receptacle yourself. You have to get a certified electrician to do it. That's insane.

Whether it's insane or not is debatable.  I've seen some people that make me nervous when changing a light globe ... but the statement is correct.  Only a licenced electrician is legally permitted to work on any fixed wiring.  It goes a step further, too.... if an electrician does work on somebody else's building, they must hold an electrical contractor's licence, or be employed by someone who does.  IIRC, they are, however, permitted to work on their own home.

And I've seen some really piss poor work by licensed electricians here in the US. A lot of it, actually.

I've also seen some people who shouldn't even change a lightbulb, too.

Here in the US, you can wire your own house if you want. As long as it passes inspection, you're fine. (You do need a licensed electrician to actually install the feed from outside *to* the main breaker. But you can install breakers, run wires, etc.)

[kcbrown]

The chance for losing nothing is 75 / 216 (3 * 5 * 5 / 216).  The chance for gaining 5x is 15 / 216 (3 * 5 / 216).  The chance for gaining 10x is 1/216.  Which means the chance of losing is (216 - 75 - 15 - 1) / 216 = 125 / 216.  With weighting, that gives me ((85 - 125) / 216), or a loss of about 19%.

Nope.

What?  Really?

Let's go through this step by step.

There are 3 six-sided dice involved.  Call them A, B, and C.   There are 6^3 = 216 possible combinations from those three dice.

There are four scenarios we're concerned about:

• One die has a value of 6 while the others do not
• Two dies have a value of 6 while the other does not
• All three dies have a value of 6
• None of the dies have a value of 6

In the first case, one of the dies is fixed with a value of 6, while the other two can have values of 1 through 5.  That means that there are 5 * 5 = 25 possible combinations when one specific die is held at 6 and the rest have a value other than 6, and there are three different dies (A, B, or C) that can be held at 6, for a total of 75 combinations for which this condition is satisfied.

In the second case, two of the dies are fixed with a value of 6, while the third can have values 1 through 5.  That means there are 5 possible combinations when two specific dies are held at 6 and the third has a value other than 6, and there are three different combinations of dies that can be held at 6 (AB, AC, and BC), for a total of 15 combinations for which this condition is satisfied.

In the third case, there is only one possible combination that satisfies the conditions.

In the fourth case, none of the dies can be 6, which means each die can have values 1 through 5, for a total of 5^3 = 125 combinations that satisfy this criteria.

125 + 1 + 15 + 75 = 216, so there are no combinations missing and nothing is overrepresented.

So now it's a question of how each possibility is weighted.  The first represents no gain and no loss, i.e. a return of zero (zero return on investment means you neither gained nor lost).  The second represents a return of 5x (which is to say you put x in, and have 5x after).  The third represents a return of 10x.  The fourth represents a return of -1x (which is to say, you put x in, and have -1x after).

The total of those weights across all the combinations is 0 * 75 + 5 * 15 + 10 * 1 + 125 * -1 = -40.  But that value is across 216 combinations, so it represents a return fraction of -.185, or an average loss of 18.5% (since each combination is equally probable).


What in the above is incorrect?

[kcbrown]

Lots of good points about building codes.  I'll respond in more depth when my brain is working again, to what little degree that might be... 

[Fungus]

The total of those weights across all the combinations is 0 * 75 + 5 * 15 + 10 * 1 + 125 * -1 = -40.  But that value is across 216 combinations, so it represents a return fraction of -.185, or an average loss of 18.5% (since each combination is equally probable).

What in the above is incorrect?

When you get two sixes you only win $4 - one of the $ on the table was already yours.

[G0HZU]

If it costs $1 to play then it would cost you $216 to explore all possibilities.

So I think 125 times you will lose, 75 times you will get one 6, 15 times you will get two and you will get three sixes once.

So I think if you went into a room with $216 and played 216 times to explore all outcomes you would come out of the room with $160.

(75x1) + (15x5) + (1 x10)  = 160

Is that correct?

[mnementh]

*Walks in and looks around the thread*

*Turns around and walks right back out, shaking head slowly*



mnem
I'm going home to mutter.

[mnementh]

[G0HZU]

I'm assuming the idea was to calculate/prove the long term trend as a percentage... So for every $216 the punter brings into the room I think the house can expect to take 216-160 = $56  which is about 26%. Obviously, you won't actually hit this long term trend reliably until you play the game a lot more times than 216.

Fungus said it was about 25% so I'd be interested to see if there's a twist to this that I've missed.

[Fungus]

So I think if you went into a room with $216 and played 216 times to explore all outcomes you would come out of the room with $160.

(75x1) + (15x5) + (1 x10)  = 160

Is that correct?

Yep. The house wins $56 of every $216 played (25.9%)

I'm assuming the idea was to calculate/prove the long term trend as a percentage... So for every $216 the punter brings into the room I think the house can expect to take 216-160 = $56  which is about 26%. Obviously, you won't actually hit this long term trend reliably until you play the game a lot more times than 216.

The house plays all night long.

Fungus said it was about 25% so I'd be interested to see if there's a twist to this that I've missed.

The interesting twist is that if you throw a single die three times there's a 50:50 chance of getting a six but if you throw three dice simultaneously it becomes a (heavily) losing game despite bigger payouts every now and again.

Can you explain why in simple terms? Common sense (not doing the math) says it's a winning game. Why are you losing?

If you think your explanation would actually convince people, google "Monty Hall Paradox" and read a few pages.