BeIR/webis-touche2020 huggingface dataset:
Deash has a compelling ideology

Daesh has an ideology that is a threat to western states, particularly those with Muslim minorities. Although Daesh’s ideology might seem incompatible with west the west an ICM poll found in 2014 that 16% of French citizens have a positive opinion of Daesh.[1] This means that western countries face an ideological clash within their own populations. A majority dislikes and fears Daesh and its ideology while a minority supports them despite their violence. Such a split reduces community cohesion and will likely breed distrust of Muslim populations (even of those who don’t have positive views of Daesh).[2] [1] Grant, Madeline, ‘16% of French Citizens Support ISIS, Poll finds’, newsweek, 26 August 2014, http://www.newsweek.com/16-french-citizens-support-isis-poll-finds-266795 [2] Hundal, Sunny, ‘The real threat from the Islamic State is to Muslims, not the west’, AlJazeera, 26 August 2014, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/08/real-threat-from-islamic-state--201482316357532975.html
The territory claimed by Daesh extends to Europe

Daesh territory currently spreads across parts of Syria and Iraq. It is this transnationalism that makes it a dangerous opponent. It is not just a threat to one state but to every state in the Middle East and North Africa. Daesh claims to be a Caliphate which means it claims leadership over the entire Muslim community. Such a claim would inevitably include European countries such as Bosnia and Albania where there are Muslim majorities. The Caliphate’s legitimacy is tied to its territorial expansion.[1] A threat to the territorial states system within the Middle East, let alone Europe, is a significant threat to the west who created that system. The deconstruction of the states of the Middle East would destroy western allies, give an extreme organisation immense oil wealth from the Gulf, and likely make Israel an untenable outpost. [1] Vick, Karl, ‘As ISIS Grows Its Territory, It Becomes Increasingly Dangerous’, Time, 15 June 2015, http://time.com/3917097/as-isis-grows-its-territory-it-becomes-increasingly-dangerous/
Daesh and the Syrian civil war is nurture terrorism for export

Daesh is a terrorist organisation.[1] There are large numbers of people within Europe who support Islamic State and Europeans travelling to fight for Daesh is an ongoing problem; more than 700 from the UK alone.[2] There is therefore concern about these people coming back and mounting terrorist attacks, as appears to have been the case with three of those involved in the 2015 Paris attacks; Omar Ismail Mostefai, Bilal Hadfi, and Samy Amimour.[3] [1] Bureau of Counterterrorism, ‘Foreign Terrorist Organizations’, U.S. Department of State, accessed 1 September 2015, http://www.state.gov/j/ct/rls/other/des/123085.htm [2] BBC News, ‘Who are Britain’s jihadists?’, 25 June 2015, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-32026985 [3] Farmer, Ben, ‘Who were the terrorists? Everything we know about the Isil attackers so far’, The Telegraph, 20th November 2015, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11996120/Paris-attack-what-we-know-about-the-suspects.html
There are other larger threats.

Terrorism by Daesh is undoubtedly a threat to the West. It is however a minor one. The largest security concern should still be the small chance of complete destruction by nuclear weapons. Tensions with Russia make this more likely than at any time since the gold war. The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists’ doomsday clock is set at 3 minutes to midnight in 1015 – it was last 3 minutes to midnight in 1984 at the height of the cold war before Gorbachev gained power in the USSR.[1] Disasters are increasingly seen as an issue of national security and Climate Change is quite possibly an even greater threat as a result of the certainly of considerable warming and the resulting disasters it is likely to bring; by 2045 the Union of Concerned Scientists say that cities such as Atlantic City could face tidal flooding more than 180 times a year resulting in costly damage.[2] [1] Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, ‘Timeline’, http://thebulletin.org/timeline [2] Union of Concerned Scientists, ‘Encroaching Tides (2014)’, http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming/impacts/effects-of-tidal-flooding-and-sea-level-rise-east-coast-gulf-of-mexico#.VliFJL9BH7Y
Daesh has little impact outside the Middle East

The main threat from Daesh is to Muslims, and to those who live in and around the areas it controls. The main goal of Islamic state is to set up an Islamic caliphate and that means the primary enemy is the existing states of the Middle East. Those who support those states, and other ‘apostates’ such as Shia Muslims are also threatened by IS but this very focus means that western states have less to worry about when considering their own national security.[1] Daesh’s priority quite simply lies within Syria and Iraq not in launching attacks against western states. It is undeniable that the threat of IS attacks exists, and Daesh has struck back against states, France and Russia, that have been fighting it but unlike with 9/11 western intervention caused the terrorist response rather than the other way around. [1] Hundal, Sunny, ‘The real threat from the Islamic State is to Muslims, not the west’, AlJazeera, 26 August 2014, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/08/real-threat-from-islamic-state--201482316357532975.html
The west is insulated by distance from Daesh

All western countries are insulated by distance from Islamic State. The closest western countries are Greece and Cyprus which is as close as the EU comes to Syria. But both are separated from Syria by the Mediterranean Sea. If Daesh were truly considered a threat of the kind that requires harsh national security responses then Europe could close its borders to the South and East – its borders with Turkey in particular. This has however not happened because the risk of terrorists (re-)entering Europe is not considered great enough to warrant such a response.
Open source software is more expensive for governments in the long run.

While open source software is not always free, it tends to be significantly cheaper than closed source alternatives. For instance, the Brazilian government’s decision to adopt open source software for its housing department in 2005 has generated savings of $120m a year.[i] Given that, the United States government alone spends $80 billion a year on information technology, the potential for total cost savings is enormous.[ii] The money saved could be used to fund more important government expenditure such as healthcare or education – the very activities that, it was claimed, could be delivered more efficiently and cheaply following widespread adoption of IT systems. Furthermore, simply by discussing adopting open source software, Microsoft has been forced to reduce its prices; it cut its prices by $35m to match Linux’s offering to the city of Munich and, when Brazil began discussing its future software plans, Microsoft was forced to offer to release a cheaper version of its new operating system, Windows Vista.[iii] Ultimately, this not only helps governments, but also helps Microsoft, as many developing nations currently rely on pirated copies of Microsoft software which undermines attempts to stop copyright fraud. [i] Kingstone, Steve, ‘Brazil adopts open-source software’, BBC News, 2/05/2005.  [ii] ‘Using Technology to Drive Productivity Gains’, Performance.gov, accessed 25/07/2013 [iii] Bailey, Dave. “Microsoft faces value challenge.” Computing. 18/06/2003.
Open source software undermines national security.

This is a matter of national security and sovereignty, as well as one of cost effectiveness. Governments around the world are increasingly shifting their operations online, which has created a vast number of digital tax returns, criminal records, DNA databases and so on. At present, access to, and use of, this information is dependent on private companies which design software to benefit their shareholders. Open source software hands control of the software needed to access that data to the government and the nation itself, and gives it the ability to shape the data and software based on its own interests. Hackers have often attacked Microsoft products because of the ubiquity of its closed source software. Hack and malware attacks are ultimately speculative ventures. They target systems that have not received essential security software updates; systems that are operated by naive and inexperienced users; or delicate specialist systems that can be disrupted by a high volume of legitimate, non-aggressive commands and interactions. Such opportunistic attacks are more likely to succeed if hackers are able to direct their efforts toward uncovering the flaws in a single operating system – such as Windows. In the past, attacks have focussed on consumers and small businesses. By moving away from closed source products, governments can decrease the likelihood that crucial government data will be compromised by a hacker or a virus attack.
Closed source software is better at meeting consumer needs.

As the demands of government IT departments become more and more complex, software developers are forced to become increasingly specialized. Yet big firms like Microsoft often lack specialist depth and an understanding of niche markets (such as the market for specialist brail screen readers, which blind individuals use to interact with computers). In many instances, governments’ needs will be better met by the open source market, where innovation and flexibility are built in. One area where is the open source community’s ability to innovate is particularly relevant to governments is language; Microsoft only supports 33 languages in Windows XP and around 20 in Office XP, as they do not have the economic incentive to provide versions for other languages and dialects. Yet governments often need to provide access to information in dozens of languages and dialects (particularly in countries like Spain with regional languages like Catalan and Basque, or India with its 18 official languages and 1000 dialects). Open source software can easily be adapted to those languages. For instance, OpenOffice has been adapted into 75 languages including Slovenian, Icelandic, Lao, Latvian, Welsh, Yiddish, Basque and Galician, and Indian languages such as Gujarati, Devanagari, Kannada and Malayalam. By using the open-source model of sharing the workload between many users, the Hungarian Foundation for Free Software was able to translate OpenOffice in three days with the help of just over a hundred programmers. By providing software specialized for the local market, government can encourage greater IT usage by citizens, thereby increasing the skill level of the workforce and multiplying the cost savings made by shifting government services online.
Open source software is more adaptable to government needs.

Open source software starts from a completely different viewpoint of how products should be created. Rather than resembling a traditional hierarchical organisation (such as an early twentieth century business, an army or a monastic order) where everyone has their own clearly defined role and are told how to proceed by a top-down central authority, open-source software development is more like an open market where everyone is engaged in the same activity but come at it from different directions.[i] Out of this cacophonous market, a more fluid product emerges. The basic advantage of open source software is that, as users can read, redistribute, and modify the source code for a piece of software, it evolves. This means that users and programmers can improve, adapt and fix the software at a much faster pace than Microsoft or another closed source developer can match. The highly collegiate culture in which contemporary approaches to coding evolved continues to create programmers who are naturally curious about the functions and features of new software. Open source software harnesses the wide range of ideas and methodologies that different coders use to writer software to refine and improve existing programmes. Open source software solicits a wide variety of solutions to particular coding problems; the more solutions that coders generate, the more likely it is that an optimal solution will be discovered. Not only does the approach described above result in the creation of higher quality programmes, it also allows businesses and individual coders to easily adapt existing programmes to their needs. Monopolistic producers like Microsoft have an incentive to slow the pace of change, whereas the open source community will simply choose the best solution. In this way, open source software is more robust and more responsive to governments’ changing needs than closed source alternatives. [i]  Raymond, Eric. “The Cathedral and the Bazaar.” Cunningham & Cunningham. 18 February 2010.
Government contracts can change the software industry for the better.

Even when governments do not ultimately select an open source program, by simply including them in the competitive bidding process, they have been able to radically change the approach that Microsoft and other closed source companies take to producing IT solutions. Under threat from Linux, Microsoft has launched the Open Source Initiative through which it shares elements of some of its programs’ source code with key partners to enable the development of software for platforms like Windows Mobile[i]. More dramatically, in 2002, Real Networks opened up the source code for its world renowned RealPlayer media and music software package and, in 2005, IBM offered 500 key patents (out of 40,000) to the open source community. Sun Microsystems released its Solaris server operating system to the open source community under the Common Development and Distribution licence in 2005. If you accept that the open source software industry is a positive force, then simply by considering open source software, governments are doing well. [i]  Ed Hansberry. “Open Source WebOS: A Win For Windows Phone?” Information Week. 12 December 2011.
Governments can re-define industry standards by choosing open source software.

Economists use the term ‘network effect’ to describe the phenomenon whereby, as several people use the same communication platform (be it a specific device, such as a telephone, or a complicated service, such as Facebook), it becomes more valuable for others to use because they can share and collaborate on work with a wider range of individuals. Network effects explain why Microsoft’s monopoly of around 90% of the desktop market with its Windows and Office software has been so hard to challenge[i]. Governments are one of the few organisations which can define industry standards because citizens and businesses increasingly have to interact with governments electronically. Brazil’s Digital Inclusion Program, for example, has selected open source software for 58 government units rather than Windows or Microsoft Office[ii]. The result is that businesses and Brazilian citizens can use the same open source software at home, knowing they will be able to interact with their government. As open source software is often either free or cheaper than closed source alternatives, this approach enables local authorities, private businesses and individual citizens to interact more easily with the state, removing many of the obstacles and objections to the wider adoption of information technology. [i]  Lie, Hakon Wium. “Microsoft’s forgotten monopoly.” CNET News. 19 June 2006. [ii] Fried, Ina. “Brazil: Digital inclusion, but how?” CNET News. 27 August 2008.
Open source software is more expensive for governments in the long run.

Open source software is often confused with free software; in fact, it is usually provided at some cost to the user. More importantly, if a Microsoft product fails, a government IT department knows that it can rely on a patch or technical support. Whereas, with open source software, they are left waiting on a community to get round to tackling the problem. This has meant that governments which choose open source software have had to pay for expensive support packages, which makes the total cost of the IT solution similar to that of the closed source software. This has been to the advantage of major consultancy firms, which are often chosen to put together IT solutions and who can make more money from pushing expensive support contracts than on upfront costs for software.  In the rush to find the software with the cheapest sticker price, there is a risk that governments will end up paying more overall for open software that lacks the accessibility and features of the closed source alternatives.
Open source software undermines national security.

Even if closed source software firms are ultimately answerable to their shareholders, their shareholders want them to produce software which meets the needs of their customers so that they can sell their products. That is why Microsoft has offered a cheap version of Windows Vista to developing nations, and has been willing to cut the price of its software in negotiations with governments around the world. More worrying than the burden that closed source software places on a government’s coffers is the threat that open source software presents to a state’s security.   By definition, the code for open source software is freely available. However, the continual attempts to hack into government computer systems demonstrate that many of the same hackers are now moving beyond mere targets of opportunity. Hackers could well take advantage of the increasing ubiquity of open source code to attack national computer systems. The additional security that open source software claims to benefit from is an illusion. Rather, it is the lack of ubiquitous open source platforms that has kept OSs such as Linux and BSD safe from attack. The possibility that an might yield some form of a reward is reduced when a hacker is presented with fewer viable targets. Although open source code may give ethical and honest coders more opportunities to spot the flaws in programmes, it also incentivises hackers to invest their efforts in spotting such flaws first.
Closed source software is better at meeting consumer needs.

Closed source software companies are more than capable of segmenting their products to reach each part of the market, as Microsoft has shown by producing its new Windows 7 operating system in a record six different versions. Microsoft’s monopoly of desktop computers ensures that if a programmer produces a niche software package or software translation for a specialized purpose, that programmer knows that potential clients will almost certainly be able to run the program if it is designed for Windows. If this monopoly is broken up and governments start to push Linux or other open source alternatives, the programmer will either have to develop for two or more platforms, thereby increasing the cost of the final product, or they will have to gamble on a single platform; both options would reduce the likelihood of the niche solution reaching the clients that need it. While open source software does allow anyone to spot a potential market and customize software to sell to that market, that access is also its great undoing. The type of accessibility that many open source products pride themselves on providing leaves projects open to abuse, either by well-meaning amateurs or intentional wreckers. Constant self-policing by the open source community is required, in order to guarantee the stability of the software it creates. An analogy can be drawn with Wikipedia, where the freedom of the mob led to defamatory statements being written about the former editor of USA Today [i]. Governments should be wary of relying on an anarchic, self-organising community to serve their IT needs, no matter how smart and well intentioned the members of that community may be. [i] Seigenthaler, John. .”A false Wikipedia “biography”.” USA Today. 29 November 2005
Open source software is more adaptable to government needs.

Open source software is not bug-proof and requires far more updates than the closed source alternatives. In fact, the most successful open source software after the operating system Linux is Apache, an open-source web-server which holds around 65% of the global market, and MySQL, an open-source database[i]. Both pieces of software are far from innovative; they are essentially just stripped-down versions of closed source programs. Real innovation is driven by the profit motive and comes from the knowledge that a firm can capitalize on a discovery, as Google has done with its search algorithm. For this reason, the open source software movement is doomed to producing mediocrity. As governments choose IT systems for five to ten years, they should look to a reliable closed source solution which provides quality rather than buying into a nebulous idea of ‘moral software’. [i]  “Microsoft’s IIS web server market share is falling.” Webserver. 3 October 2011.
Government contracts can change the software industry for the better.

The first firm to shift to the open source approach was Netscape with its Navigator web browser, because it was being outperformed by the closed source Microsoft Internet Explorer; Netscape made the shift out of desperation. This is exactly the same reason why Sun and Real have made their programs open source - Solaris was being squeezed by Windows based server software and RealPlayer by iTunes and Spotify. Similarly, the patents which IBM is sharing and the narrow range of source code that Microsoft is now opening up relate to sectors and product markets where neither firm is dominant and where they hope they can leverage the programming community to boost the quality of the software they are offering. Since Microsoft launched the Open Source Initiative, it has not expanded it in response to other governments threatening to shift to open source software. Therefore, we should not view this initiative as the beginning of a trend.
Governments can re-define industry standards by choosing open source software.

The network effect is more complex than the argument that, if a government uses a product, then its population will too. Firstly, 90% of desktop PCs use Microsoft products; the cost for companies and citizens to transition from Microsoft to an open source alternative makes it prohibitive in the short term. Secondly, open source software works on the basis of a constant flow of updates and minor changes; this may be suitable for servers (where it has already made most impact) managed by IT professionals, but the average citizen or government worker would require continual training and re-training before they could be trusted to implement and use such updates correctly. Open source software is being jumped on by some governments as a tool to attack Microsoft’s monopoly but, in the end, it will cost them time and money.
Heavy handed approaches do not solve the motivations for poaching

Creating tougher responses to poaching will not deter poachers as they fail to recognise the motivations for illegal hunting. Many hunters, especially those who aren’t native to Africa, take part in poaching as there is a thrill in the illegal status.[1] The close calls, challenges and sense of independence will all be multiplied by increased protection on the game reserves. Then there are those who take part out of necessity. Poachers will often be able to make $50-100 per kilogram for a rhinoceros’ horn[2] and the bush meat from kills can be a necessary source of nutrition.[3] Poaching creates opportunities for Africans which are usually unavailable in licit work. Tougher protection of animals fails to provide an alternative livelihood for these poachers.   [1] Forsyth, C. & Marckese, T. ‘Thrills and skills: a sociological analysis of poaching’ pg.162 [2] Stewart, C. ‘Illegal ivory trade funds al-shabaab’s terrorist attacks’ [3] BBC, “Lions ‘facing extinction in West Africa’”