Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't • Hacker News Board

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#121

Post by derefr » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:44 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #99

derefr wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A more interesting question, to me: would it be more or less dangerous to create a fictional person, who "is" a lawyer—or a fictional LLP, run by such a person†—and then send a letter written "as" them, representing you? By sending such a letter, I'm not claiming to be a lawyer, right? But then, what am I doing? † The law was at least smart enough here to require a partnership structure. Imagine if your fictional law…

> By sending such a letter, I'm not claiming to be a lawyer, right? Wrong. The author of the letter (you) is falsely claiming to be a lawyer. You are also falsely claiming other things, which may or may not have additional consequences.

I don't see how. I'm not falsely claiming that I'm a lawyer. I'm falsely claiming that someone else is a lawyer—a fictional person. (I write claims in the voices of fictional people all the time; I'm a novelist.) Is it because I would presumably be writing the letter with a first-person-viewpoint prose style?

If so, then would it change anything if I just wrote a letter as myself, saying that I would contact my named, fictitious lawyer and have them draw up a suit against the recipient?

Or, on a completely different (ridiculous) tangent: if a program generates an email claiming that it's a lawyer (not from a template written by a person; from genuine black-box deep-learning text generation, hooked straight up to an email client, without foreknowledge or expectation from the author that this would be the result), has the author of the program committed a crime? I would assume the author in that case more parallels the owner of an animal that did something that would have been a crime if a human did it, but is very blurry without the presumed mens rea humanity brings to the table.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#122

Post by geggam » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:44 PM UTC

So is what he discussed actually relevant and is this an attempt to silence someone ?

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#123

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:44 PM UTC

[deleted]

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#124

Post by coupdejarnac » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:45 PM UTC

musesum wrote: post #92

coupdejarnac wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it was because of the engineering license issue, most or all states have similar laws.

Put obliquely: I suspect that Washington or California would have yielded better outcomes.

Perhaps. Here in Texas, practicing engineering without a license will result in a fine and a cease and desist, with criminal charges on subsequent occurrences.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#125

Post by JBReefer » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:46 PM UTC

nxc18 wrote: post #79

monochromatic wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You really do get to say whatever the fuck you want in this country, as long as it doesn't cause direct harm to someone else The Supreme Court disagrees.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_words for example. There are more limitations but that's an easy and possibly counterintuitive example.

That and the Shouting Fire thing are both directly harmful. Calling yourself an engineer, not a PE, without a a PE is not directly harmful, and the Constitution overrides state laws that claim otherwise. My money is on him in this one.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#126

Post by djoldman » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:48 PM UTC

objclxt wrote: post #91

djoldman wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, you can't yell fire in a movie theater unless there's a fire[0]. You can't assert that you are a doctor(lawyer) while giving medical(law) advice. There are good reasons for these laws. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shouting_fire_in_a_crowded_the...

Not the fire in a crowded theater thing again! Take a look at Trope 2 here (written by an actual lawyer): https://www.popehat.com/2015/05/19/how-to-spot-and-critique-... It's a meaningless saying that doesn't actually have any real bearing on the law or the first amendment.

Perhaps bringing up that exact saying wasn't the best choice. My purpose was to illustrate that it is factually illegal to say certain things.

Other examples besides claiming to be a doctor/lawyer while giving advice include: remarks that constitute credible threats to someone's life.

By the way, and appropriate to this thread, I am not a lawyer.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#127

Post by takk309 » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:49 PM UTC

ryanmarsh wrote: post #113

I just did a search for "software engineer" in Oregon on Indeed. Shopify and many others are using the term engineer in their job listings. Are candidates referring to themselves as engineers to get these jobs? Are they then putting themselves at risk?

Context matters. The job listings you are finding are not implying they are traffic engineering positions.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#128

Post by jack9 » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:51 PM UTC

So now we have a place where you can self-identify as an opposing gender but not as a profession you practice. I'd duplicate his letters to the same recipients, if I could.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#129

Post by jpambrun » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:53 PM UTC

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #109

Professional licensing of just about every kind serves one and one purpose only: Fatten someone's pocket and artificially restrict the labor supply to favor those already licensed. Period. You can certainly make an argument that it looks like he went out of his way to piss 'em off, but the fact that he could be charged for calling himself "an engineer" -- and the fact that we all have come to a point where we think i…

No. It's about public safety. Do you want anybody calling themselves Doctors and making surgery without proper training? How about civil engineers building bridge? How about software engineers that work on medical devices that can kill?

If you are building iOS apps you are probably a developer, not an engineer.

Re: Man Fined $500 for Crime of Writing 'I Am an Engineer' in an Email to the Gov't

#130

Post by takk309 » Tue, Apr 25, 2017, 10:53 PM UTC

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #109

Professional licensing of just about every kind serves one and one purpose only: Fatten someone's pocket and artificially restrict the labor supply to favor those already licensed. Period. You can certainly make an argument that it looks like he went out of his way to piss 'em off, but the fact that he could be charged for calling himself "an engineer" -- and the fact that we all have come to a point where we think i…

Professional licensing exists to protect the public at large from fraud. Would you want a public building, say a sports stadium, designed by someone without the proper training? Engineering licenses add a layer of protection and assurance that the person performing the work is truly capable of performing the work.