[FRIAM] Digital Courts (Was: Yay!)

Mon Jan 11 15:39:08 EST 2021

On 1/11/21 11:28 AM, thompnickson2 at gmail.com <mailto:thompnickson2 at gmail.com>  wrote:

>  1. A society cannot survive without an idea of truth, at least as a goal.

>  2. We have numerous mechanisms for determining truth, notably the courts.  Every day Juries and courts decide matters of fact.  Fallibly, inconsistently, probabilistically. 

>  3. We cannot have platforms deciding matters of truth.

>  4. Therefore, we are going to have to institute digital courts.

>  5. It is up to people like FRIAM members to cogitate on what a digital court will look like.

And Glen replied, in part: 

But your assumption #1 is laughable at first blush. What even is a "society"? What does it mean for it/they to have a goal? Etc. But you could sidestep that by talking of a "Constitution" for the internet, a foundation for some sort of "rule of law". Then it would be possible to build something like a court system for texts/artifacts you might find there.

I can see how my #1, with its knee-jerk pragmatism, might be a flag to a bull.  I am really trying to get to #5 on my list above, and I don’t much care how I get there.  I want us to cogitate.  For instance, what is the jury pool for the digital court.  For starters, “Every user of the internet, verified as an inididual person, is a member of the jury pool.  Jury pool members agree, when “summoned”, to participate in a digital jury.  Digital jurors shall serve as finders of fact in digital trials 

Nicholas Thompson

Emeritus Professor of Ethology and Psychology

Clark University

ThompNickSon2 at gmail.com

https://wordpress.clarku.edu/nthompson/

-----Original Message-----
From: Friam <friam-bounces at redfish.com> On Behalf Of u?l? ???
Sent: Monday, January 11, 2021 2:02 PM
To: friam at redfish.com
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] yay!

MGD -- Sorry for being unclear. I think at least some of the COVID-19 deaths are due to premature convergence. E.g. I got into a discussion at the (outdoor) pub about a month ago with 2 friends who've known each other since grade school. They both lean coservative, but one seemed much more data driven (and willing to call out his friend for saying stupid stuff he learned from Fox News). When they *both* expressed their irritation that gyms, bowling alleys, etc. were locked down even though most of our evidence points to social gatherings, I tried to make the point that our evidence is simply not fine-grained enough. So, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

The more reasonable guy got it. The other guy didn't. So, in the meantime, we *could* control how the convergence happens, the violence of any necessary heat baths to back out of premature convergence *if* we have the language to use with our prematurely converged peers. Without that language, we're just shrill tribalists. But I agree completely on the tech front. Witness libgen and sci-hub and their multi-platform paths through tech like IPFS, torrent, etc. Such separates the profiteers from those truly devoted to their mission.

NST -- As for digital courts, I don't think that's a bad idea at all, for the same reason I don't think we should accuse sitting congress people of things like "sedition" just for voting aye on the objections to electoral votes. The disinformation peddlers, sure. But not the rank and file who simply voted. But your assumption #1 is laughable at first blush. What even is a "society"? What does it mean for it/they to have a goal? Etc. But you could sidestep that by talking of a "Constitution" for the internet, a foundation for some sort of "rule of law". Then it would be possible to build something like a court system for texts/artifacts you might find there.

On 1/11/21 11:28 AM, Marcus Daniels wrote:

> I think we should not get so hung up on the dying and going crazy.   The numbers aren't like COVID-19.   There's nothing the wackos could really do to get to numbers like that, other them to kill themselves by eating too many jerky sticks.   There's the national embarrassment aspect that could bleed over into national security, and of course there is the lunatic with the nuke codes.

> 

> If a site intends to do something distasteful but not quite illegal, why would they ever tie themselves to platform where it is so trivial to be turned off?  They deserve it just for their lack of foresight. 

On 1/11/21 11:28 AM,  <mailto:thompnickson2 at gmail.com> thompnickson2 at gmail.com wrote:

>  1. A society cannot survive without an idea of truth, at least as a goal.

>  2. We have numerous mechanisms for determining truth, notably the courts.  Every day Juries and courts decide matters of fact.  Fallibly, inconsistently, probabilistically. 

>  3. We cannot have platforms deciding matters of truth.

>  4. Therefore, we are going to have to institute digital courts.

>  5. It is up to people like FRIAM members to cogitate on what a digital court will look like. 

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