The Right of Privacy
Surprisingly I'm not talking about abortion. Privacy is one of the few issues that I don't have a clear philosophical position on. I think instinctively everyone has a right not to be bothered, especially not by the government, but I don't think a iron right to "privacy" can ever be enforced, for free speech considerations and technological issues. The Lewinsky and Foley scandals, that deal with the Facebook intern and personal experience has convinced me that in the future we're not going to be able enforce even reasonable (not ideological) bounds on privacy in the future. Your personal information, even what normal people would consider "private" stuff, like one's sex life and immature childhood behavior will be instantly Google-able to anyone interested. Already there are algorithmic programs scanning Flickr and Photobucket reconstructing personal histories, and police are solving crimes using Myspace. Privacy is going to be a huge social issue in the future and is going to force us to rethink alot of instinctual behavior, like superficial condemnation and the political process.
Thoughts?
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