From: darknite@camelot.bradley.edu (John S. Novak III)
Subject: Re: Using killfiles is a form of censorship (was: Re: A Modest Request
Organization: Bradley University
Date: 28 Jul 92 20:43:52 GMT

Ed Nilges writes:

>>Yes, it's to give us the ability to express *new* concepts, not to
>>express old ones (at least, not outside of art).

>Oh?  Are you going to enforce the perimeter of "art?"  

Not really, but I'm willing to bet that you are.

>Among other things, unix is literature...art.  Its use of "kill" files
>is therefore open to psychoanalysis.  Among other things, programming is
>writing.  I know that certain parties would have us believe that
>programming is something else, perhaps the language of the gods.  But
>nope, programming is writing.  Written by human beings who sometimes
>have the urge to kill.  Indeed, much code for the network originated in
>war-making "defense" applications and is doubly freighted with a
>murderous purpose.

Ya know, every once in a while, someone shows up in a
conversation whose world-view is at _just_ enough of an angle
from reality that its impossible to effectively argue with him.

But I'm bored, so I might as well give it a try.

Let's see... Unix is art?  Only if you care to define _any_ Human
activity as art.  I certainly don't.  Tell me, is my signature on
a bank check a work of art?  Just because it is writing, and
therefore, 'literature'?  Hmm.  How about when I take a multiple
choice exam in some subject, and write down a series of a's, b's,
and c's?  Is that art, too?  Or maybe my kinny-garten 'rithmetic
tests, where I painstakingly wrote down, '1+4=5' and '4-3=1'.  I
guess that's art, too.

I guess signing my name on the check is evidence of a deep-seated
to sign my name on little slips of paper, eh?  I won't even
hazard a guess at the other two.

Incidentally, have you ever read Umberto Eco's definition of a lunatic?
Incidentally, when are you going to mention the Templars?
Incidentally, ma gavte la nada.
>>Go into a little more detail than that or I (and others, I hope) will
>>publicly assume (rightfully) that you mean that CPU time can feed,
>>clothe and shelter humans by itself. You're making yourself look silly
>>again, this time by making blatant assertions that depend on such
>>phantom authorities as "...it's well-known that...".

>No, I mean that for Weizenbaum's "subculture of the compulsive
>programmer", developing code can be an outlet for all sorts of impulses,
>including destructive impulses.  

Which of course means that anyone who uses said program has
_exactly_ the same (implied) destructive impulses, and chooses to
let _exactly_ those subconscious triggers be an outlet for
_exactly_ those impulses in _exactly_ the same way.

Aside from which (oh, god, no, not some formal logic!!) the fact
that developing code CAN be an outlet for destructive impulses
implies in no way shape or form that the programmer has those
destructive impulses you ascribe, nor does it mean that given
those impulses the programmer _does_ outlet them in that way.

Incidentally, ma gavte la nada.

>Bzzt.  I did not "imply that said" (sic.)  You read that into the post.
>I don't condemn all destructive behavior as bad, anymore than I condemn
>all censorship.  I metaphorically "killed" Henry Schaffer in retaliation
>for his terroristic lie.  

Don't ascribe your particular fetishes and neuroses to the rest
of us.

>What I am saying (once more: this is like pulling teeth) is that the
>defenders of "freedom" pose as nondestructive friends of free speech who
>would not harm speakers, and that this is a false posture that is belied
>by their use of kill files and other gambits that display intense
>hostility towards open dialog.

Maybe intense hostility towards open dialog with _you_.  That
doesn't make it into a General Thing.  And, by the by, what you
originally said is that kill files are censorship.  Which is
patent nonsense, and you know it.  Thus you attempt to change
your argument.



--
"No opera plot can be sensible, for people do not sing when they
are feeling sensible."
		-- W. H. Auden
John S. Novak, III		darknite@camelot.bradley.edu