I mean -- if I'm going to join a team to solve the hard 20%, I'd like to see the idea validated against the easy 80% first.

If it's really bad, at least the easy 20%.

I mean — the ideal of an SQL query is you say what you want, and it’s up to the engine to determine how to give it to you — that is, being declarative.

Part of it is there’s so many different ways to represent data, and even more ways to compute a given quantity — but the quantity itself often has a clear definition (sum this column from all rows where this holds, say)

A human genome fits on a single hard drive -- think of all the ways you could fill it?

Irrelevant. Genetic code is a human interpreted construct. It lacks infinite complexity because it is a mirror that we can understand and use. Like a code for a computer. You are not looking far enough into the real world.

Encryption is mathematics -- making this an issue of freedom not only of speech, but of thought.

Technology means there is only one truly stable compromise, imo: I am free to use whatever technical means at my disposal to encrypt my communications and those of my customers (!), and you can try to read them as much as you want.

Combined with the right to communicate across borders, you can get quite a bit of privacy: a server in both sides of a geopolitical conflict and they've got to collaborate to track you.

And yet metadata collection is both unavoidable (if you don't collect it, your geopolitical opponents will) and should be enough. We don't need chat control in a world where I get precision-targeted ads -- it's not even about freedom of speech or privacy, it's about freedom of thought.

> a server in both sides of a geopolitical conflict and they've got to collaborate to track you.

With a server on the other side of a geopolitical conflict (actual conflict, not a mere discontinuity in legalscape) you trade a risk of the government reading your chats for a risk of the same government (which you don't trust for a good reason) locking you up for treason and espionage.

You are essentially saying that walking is safe because as a civilian you are unlikely to get robbed.

This is a terrible take. All it takes is an angry mugger, and you could get killed.

Walking is not illegal.

That's why your analogy doesn't work.

> champagne

Makes sense, sort of...

> crude oil

I really hope that's cheaper than ink or we're gonna have a problem...

Don't think the second amendment covers firing

That’s why we’ve got the tenth.

E(accident due to going faster) vs E(worse outcome due to waiting)

Your argument only makes sense if the only possible bad thing is a car accident -- to make my point clearer, would you take a 1% chance of losing 100$ to avoid a 50% chance of losing 10$?

Depends how much money you have, but it can be a perfectly rational decision.

I think the fundamental issue is that a form of equality where everyone gets what was previously the worst outcome is... probably worse.

Many times when politicians get to suffer the full effects of their laws, the laws quickly change for the better.