[FRIAM] Meanwhile, back on the troll farms
Steven A Smith
sasmyth at swcp.com
Thu May 7 16:45:05 EDT 2020
> The folks at SFI did a paper a couple of years ago about how snippets
> of constitutions have propagated into other constitutions around the
> world…
>
> … Bob
>
And one wonders what is "beyond psyops" where "deep staters"
(illuminati?) so deep they transcend states go about like retroviruses,
inserting sequences into the genome (law/policy?) apparatus of
nations? Wait, I think this very likely multinational corporations and
industry-lobbies (fossil fuels, guns/arms, ??? ) and the wealthy
families/individuals behind/entwined-with them are doing!
"I love/hate it when a metaphor comes together!" (visualize George
Peppard muttering this around a fat stogie)
>> On May 7, 2020, at 2:23 PM, Steven A Smith <sasmyth at swcp.com
>> <mailto:sasmyth at swcp.com>> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Nick -
>>
>> I doubt I can do justice to this for you, but will give a try.
>>
>> The idea(l) behind open-source is two-fold:
>>
>> 1. develop a "commons" of re-useable resources to be shared by
>> all. This concept really took off with the introduction of
>> Linus Thorvald's Adaptation of BSD Unix to run on IBM PCs and an
>> explosion of software built on top of and around that one
>> thing. This movement began a lot earlier and the world of
>> Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD) variant of ATT Unix was
>> perhaps the strongest center for that... other efforts I was
>> aware of include things like the Andrew File System (AFS) out of
>> CMU (nod to Frank) and project Athena out of MIT.
>> 2. crowdsource the troubleshooting, debugging, and validation of
>> system's design. By making the source code available and free
>> to use (with some restrictions), large numbers of system/software
>> designers become motivated to look at, adopt, improve, build-upon
>> that code-base and thereby improve and vet the code well. There
>> are notable exceptions indicating that big holes/bugs can exist
>> in spite of this scrutiny. I think there was a hoopla a few
>> years ago around some (obvious?) security holes in the primary
>> open-source router software used in most pro-sumer grade network
>> routers, and maybe even commercial-class ones.
>>
>> This GitHub thing Roger posted is (as Roger indicated in his
>> subject/post) is clearly trolling on behalf of the anti-lockdown
>> movement... trying to use the open-source community mechanism (open
>> and free view of the software and the process of it's development,
>> and the ability for anyone to pitch in, comment, criticize) against
>> the ideas behind this particular model (and ANY? similar model).
>>
>> I'm not sure this is a first, but from what I know, there haven't
>> been "political" trolls haranguing GitHub mediated open-source
>> efforts... there have probably been "religious" wars between
>> differing schools of thought on the best way to solve a particular
>> problem, but the preferred way to handle that is to FORK the project
>> and let the alternative subset go pursue their alternative ideas.
>>
>> To some extent, this is the way the world is responding to the
>> pandemic at a policy level. Each country roughly has it's own
>> unique/idiosyncratic response to the pandemic... some perhaps taking
>> their lead from others. Within the USA (and I presume other
>> "federated" governments) we have states/governors following the
>> general guidelines (lame as they may be) of the federal government
>> and modifying/elaborating them to match their regional context, and
>> again each county/city/borough/neighborhood may well do the same.
>> In principle these policies are open and transparent as are the data
>> that are gathered at each level on the resources expended and the
>> results obtained. This is the Open-Data aspect that Tom Johnson and
>> others here promote.
>>
>> The US Constitution (and our entire body of law) might be considered
>> open-source and I suspect more than a few states and younger
>> countries have borrowed parts of our constitution and legal system to
>> build their own from (for better and worse)... just as our Foundling
>> Fatheds apparently used some of the features exhibited by the (orally
>> maintained) Iroquois Federation and the ideas of French political
>> thinkers such as Montesquieu.
>>
>> </ramble>
>>
>> - Steve
>>
>>> Marcus,
>>>
>>> Thanks for taking my question seriously. I understood what I was
>>> talking about even less than I usually do.
>>>
>>> Let’s say I was an evil genius and wanted to introduce evil code
>>> into a project on github. What would happen?
>>>
>>> N
>>>
>>> Nicholas Thompson
>>> Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology
>>> Clark University
>>> ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com <mailto:ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com>
>>> https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/
>>>
>>>
>>> *From:* Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> *On Behalf Of *Marcus Daniels
>>> *Sent:* Thursday, May 7, 2020 11:05 AM
>>> *To:* The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee
>>> Group <Friam at redfish.com>
>>> *Subject:* Re: [FRIAM] Meanwhile, back on the troll farms
>>>
>>> Nick writes:
>>> * *
>>> *< *What exactly IS the policing mechanism in open source.
>>> Darwinian? Reputational? Does this HAVE to provoke a crisis of
>>> confidence in the general public? Or could it be seen as a heroic
>>> thrown-together first step that is now being improved? >
>>>
>>> They are whining about simple or absent unit tests as a litmus test
>>> for whether the code is reliable. It’s like saying you don’t dare
>>> drive your car if you didn’t take out its alternator and test its
>>> voltage output last week. ‘cause someone might have changed the
>>> alternator! Eventually there will be consequences if the
>>> alternator fails, like stalling or the battery dying. Same thing
>>> in a big simulation. All of the parts and pieces of a simulation
>>> are there for a reason and global things will start to change in
>>> noticeable ways if something is broken. I would say getting
>>> mechanisms working correctly is less difficult that choosing what
>>> mechanisms are appropriate in the first place. Usually in use of a
>>> simulation one has instrumentation available on almost everything,
>>> and there is a constant checking and double- checking even if those
>>> checks are not embodied in automated tests. Automated tests can
>>> even give a false sense of security, because they may not deal with
>>> the parameter ranges that happen in with the coupled system. If you
>>> would rather have a bunch of unit tests, or to have modelers using
>>> and stressing the code every day, you have the wrong priorities.
>>>
>>> My irritation is with the notion of unit tests as a prerequisite for
>>> code reliability. There are tighter ways to integrate assertions
>>> of code behavior with the code. The bandwagon obsession with unit
>>> tests is in some sense an obstacle even better practices. I
>>> wouldn’t even call them trolls, because a troll has intention to
>>> rile people up. These folks are more like pompous ditto heads who
>>> feel the need to posture about the right way to do software
>>> engineering. People that love unit tests love not understanding
>>> the problem they are solving, and prefer to work in pieces. This
>>> take a is a little harsh, but in this context (advising COVID-19
>>> policy) I don’t find the behavior very helpful.
>>>
>>> Marcus
>>>
>>>
>>> .-. .- -. -.. --- -- -..-. -.. --- - ... -..-. .- -. -.. -..-. -.. .- ... .... . ...
>>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>>> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam>
>>> unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>>> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
>>> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
>> .-. .- -. -.. --- -- -..-. -.. --- - ... -..-. .- -. -.. -..-. -.. .-
>> ... .... . ...
>> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
>> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam
>> <http://bit.ly/virtualfriam>
>> unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
>> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
>> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
>
>
> .-. .- -. -.. --- -- -..-. -.. --- - ... -..-. .- -. -.. -..-. -.. .- ... .... . ...
> FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
> Zoom Fridays 9:30a-12p Mtn GMT-6 bit.ly/virtualfriam
> unsubscribe http://redfish.com/mailman/listinfo/friam_redfish.com
> archives: http://friam.471366.n2.nabble.com/
> FRIAM-COMIC http://friam-comic.blogspot.com/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://redfish.com/pipermail/friam_redfish.com/attachments/20200507/94df60ac/attachment.html>
More information about the Friam
mailing list