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NSA Owns Everything (2015)

blog.thinkst.com

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Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#121

Post by rriepe »

jacquesm wrote: post #104

The difference between a theory, a conspiracy theory and the truth are best described by varying levels of evidence. A theory is not currently accepted as the truth, but it might be the truth. A conspiracy theory is something that has been proven to be untrue, but people still believe it and pass it on. The truth is the internally consistent and fact supported state of the world as it was and as it is. There were man…

The phrase "conspiracy theory" is, top-to-bottom, a word to get you to stop thinking. It's not a conspiracy theory, it's just the history of the phrase. It's the outgroup concept applied directly to the concept of new or disagreeing information. A pre-emptive propaganda strike on anyone who might ask questions.

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#122

Post by smolder »

jacquesm wrote: post #104

The difference between a theory, a conspiracy theory and the truth are best described by varying levels of evidence. A theory is not currently accepted as the truth, but it might be the truth. A conspiracy theory is something that has been proven to be untrue, but people still believe it and pass it on. The truth is the internally consistent and fact supported state of the world as it was and as it is. There were man…

A conspiracy theory is just a theory that a conspiracy has happened. In popular usage there's an assumption that it's incorrect, but that's not part of the definition of conspiracy theory.

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#123

Post by amiga_500 »

sanderjd wrote: post #119
amiga_500 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All it took was one person willing to burn their career to provide the proof. So many of the below posts are about all kinds of crazy conspiracy theories (most of them vastly overreach the competence of the USA), but this part hits the nail. USA's problem is the culture. The idea that if each person pursues their own self-interest it will amount, in aggregate, to the best possible outcome - this is totally flawed.…

I happen to be reading a biography of Alexander Hamilton right now and I think Washington was pretty disappointed in the people of his own time too. And the members of each faction thought the members of the other factions were "un-American" (though I don't think they had that term). The founding era was not a golden age, there's always been a battle for control of our culture.

I would agree that he had high standards, but he was mostly unhappy with some rank-and-file who were coerced into joining up, so I can hardly blame them. Other factions were not part of the whole at that point, so there was no back-stabbing there, to begin with.

Would he have been happy if he found out one of his immediate reports had been helping the French to get gunpowder in for a cut? Analogous to the wholesale tax dodging today.

Seems today "it's just business", back then he'd have been hung. Yes life back then wasn't all knights in shining armor, but now, good god.

Even if people didn't always comply to the code, there was a code and that code wasn't "every man for himself". They would have regarded that as insanity.

BTW I might read the Hamilton one next, I imagine it's Chernow you are reading, he has an engaging writing style.

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#124

Post by daffy »

fsflover wrote: post #81
numpad0 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They still need some parts of blobs to configure/initialize the system and that “some” now means full MINIX kernel along its userland

You are talking about Coreboot, not Libreboot. The latter has no blobs whatsoever.

Does that mean that a firmware backdoor is impossible or very unlikely?

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#126

Post by switch11 »

jacquesm wrote: post #104

The difference between a theory, a conspiracy theory and the truth are best described by varying levels of evidence. A theory is not currently accepted as the truth, but it might be the truth. A conspiracy theory is something that has been proven to be untrue, but people still believe it and pass it on. The truth is the internally consistent and fact supported state of the world as it was and as it is. There were man…

a conspiracy theory is not 'something that has been proven to not be true'

Snowden's leak is a good example of something that proved a lot of conspiracy theories to be true

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#127

Post by jacquesm »

smolder wrote: post #122
jacquesm wrote: post #104

The difference between a theory, a conspiracy theory and the truth are best described by varying levels of evidence. A theory is not currently accepted as the truth, but it might be the truth. A conspiracy theory is something that has been proven to be untrue, but people still believe it and pass it on. The truth is the internally consistent and fact supported state of the world as it was and as it is. There were man…

A conspiracy theory is just a theory that a conspiracy has happened. In popular usage there's an assumption that it's incorrect, but that's not part of the definition of conspiracy theory.

If you're going to pick nits at least use the full definition. For a shorthand it was accurate enough, and in popular usage the assumption is not that it is incorrect but that the facts as known do not support the outrageous claims made by the believers in these theories.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Conspiracy_theory#Etymology_an...

Examples such as the Climate Change hoax, Moon Landing hoax, COVID-19 hoax, New World Order and so on abound and I probably should not even give them the courtesy of repeating them here because they are like little bits of actively infectious DNA that will sooner or later encounter a fertile medium for reproduction.

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#128

Post by jacquesm »

switch11 wrote: post #126
jacquesm wrote: post #104

The difference between a theory, a conspiracy theory and the truth are best described by varying levels of evidence. A theory is not currently accepted as the truth, but it might be the truth. A conspiracy theory is something that has been proven to be untrue, but people still believe it and pass it on. The truth is the internally consistent and fact supported state of the world as it was and as it is. There were man…

a conspiracy theory is not 'something that has been proven to not be true' Snowden's leak is a good example of something that proved a lot of conspiracy theories to be true

You are missing the point. The theory that the NSA was hovering up everything in sight was just a theory. We did not have proof one way or the other, and quite a bit of circumstantial evidence to conclude that it was in fact happening.

At that stage it was 'just a theory', with little support.

That some people then went a step further and mislabeled it is mostly their problem, they should have realized that the standard of proof required to shift it one way or the other wasn't available. Snowden gave us that proof.

Your average conspiracy theory is trying to make claims that go against available evidence to try to come up with some kind of alternate history of what must be true. Typically these involve privileged knowledge, powerful people and internally inconsistent claims.

The NSA could be listening in on a lot more than they are letting on theory never had any of those problems.

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#129

Post by jjcon »

jialutu wrote: post #61
harry8 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But are they really though? Could well be a threat there but I want actual evidence when the threat bogeyman is invoked in the name of more power. I believed the WMD lie. I hope I have learned from that. If we believe the NSA then your question is exactly the right one to ask and has some obvious implications.

I think this might interest you: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nayirah_testimony So pretty much all of US's wars in Iraq has been based on lies.

I think you mean US, UK, Spain, Australia, Poland war's. Also, the war would have happened with or without her testimony so I'm not sure your point holds.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Multi-National_Force_%E2%80%...

Re: NSA Owns Everything (2015)

#130

Post by maerF0x0 »

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #112
jacquesm wrote: post #104

The difference between a theory, a conspiracy theory and the truth are best described by varying levels of evidence. A theory is not currently accepted as the truth, but it might be the truth. A conspiracy theory is something that has been proven to be untrue, but people still believe it and pass it on. The truth is the internally consistent and fact supported state of the world as it was and as it is. There were man…

>All it took was one person willing to burn their career to provide the proof. This is wrong. It took a LOT more than that. It took one man forgoing his life and liberty , and a group of people endangering theirs to assist him. Snowdon is not going to get his life nor his liberty back, ever. It took multiple institutions dedicated to publishing the truth to actually bring the news to a wide audience, and it didn't en…

> willing to burn their career to provide the proof.

This should have been the case as in normal whistleblower cases. Seems it was not. I also suspect that Russia will eventually try and call the favor to coerce him to do something for them

EDIT: had no idea this would be so negatively viewed. If you're going to down vote please indicate what you're against...

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