Although I think Flieschman and Pons had the wrong theory, even NASA is now proposing LENR reactions. I do not think they were frauds or fools, just reporting anomalies. And for this, thanks to MIT, they were destroyed. MITs motive, obviously, is that they get millions for hot fusion experiments.

MIT should apologize to a lot of people for their non-scientific, non-open attitude

To blindly dismiss or ignore a cause or person’s actions simply because they are unlawful is active ignorance. I’d refer you to ideas found in Thoreau’s Civil Disobedience.

As Howard Zinn said, “Protest beyond the law is not a departure from democracy; it is absolutely essential to it.”

http://unqualified-reservations.blogspot.ro/2013/01/noam-chomsky-killed-aaron-swartz.html

The university system in the US is one of the sources of political power (the primary one, as the author of this article reveals in previous posts). Swartz happened to inadvertently become a dissident to the system and was dealt with accordingly. The only way to prevent such tragedies from happening in the future is to wrest political power from the universities when that option presents itself (a nearly impossible task). Until then, we should try to submit to their rule; for our own good.

This! We don’t always agree (^^); but sometimes we do.

Have a nice day.

Don’t you think we have more advances and progresses in all fields of endeavour if there is some incentive for those bringing them about?

I bet, and no offense intended, that you don’t hold the prospect of creating something that would be under the protection of intellectual copyright, ever.

Ps: Ray didn’t gift me his new book, either ;(

If we take untestable metaphysical beliefs out of this, we can substitute mind for brain.

If we do so, it should become immediately obvious that a 1,5Kg lump of gray mass formed by blind trial and error can’t even physically be able to cover the whole range “of what really is and should be”, in this vast and “complex” universe.

Furthermore another way to see this:
A brain with perfect knowledge about something that is not perfectly frozen still undergoes changes in the course of living, and every change from this perfect condition leads to one that’s less than perfect.Or do you think there are many perfections and no ultimate truths that can be determined according to rationally chosen criteria?I think there is one way things really are, so bear with me;)

Therefore, our brilliant persons -which we recognized by the products of their thoughts, and thus by actions [change]; by living- must have minds with blind spots in their knowledge (which is the material of their judgement).

There are millions other reasons why a normal human being must have blind spots, only the ape in us lives in denial, because want’s some paternalistic authority to look up to and to misuse in arguments that could be entirely decided by looking at the objective facts of a given situation.

He shouldn’t have killed himself though, and it is sad that those who have taken up his banner didn’t do so earlier.I think this could have been avoided.

I also think the punishment for what he did is ridiculously high, especially if you compare it to the punishment of people who actually killed, assaulted etc others and get away with less.

“Is it a malefaction to give back to us what we have already paid for with our tax money?”

Newspeak… of course not.In a sense states are partly (as to date) necessary bullies, whose elements always try to look how far they can go in maximizing their utility.Certain laws are akin to theft.Only consens makes it look otherwise.

Ps: John’s comment about Turing is extremly ridiculous.He harmed nobody, following this line of reasoning we should use technology to punish even thought crimes preemptively.

And if jesus would have been a mainstream jew, nobody would have heard about him.

Which acts of ignomy did they commit, that are not just called so by definition?

Arbitrary or harmful rules should be ruled out^^

Judicial right doesn’t necessarily equal moral right (as historical cases have proven, of which you only need one to show this), laws are based on strengths within a given system (state/country), and if we think we know better and think we have the necessary leverage we ought to change laws for the better.

Another way to see this:
Does anyone here think the laws of their societies are perfect (!) for all times to come?
Does anyone think that people within “the system” lack incentives to interfere with positive change?
Does anyone here think that necessary improvements also necessitate change?
Do you think it is right to be able to bully someone just because of your position in the state apparatus?No?
Do you think we should not allows this to become “de-facto” law? Yes?

If you agree with this, then it should be clear that change is a necessity, must be helped from the outside of the system, by which I mean helped or even initiated by citizens who are not state-employees, and that someone ought to do it.

It is a truism that a democracy needs an educated, alert and active citizenry!

Another truism is that it is better to do something about a problem instead of just complaining (I wanted to use a stronger word)!
It follows you have to take action.

E.g people who can should sign that petition mentioned here.

What we have heard about was a clear case of someone deriving satisfaction from the abuse -with dire and ultimate consequences- of the powers bestowed upon her by the people, and this therefore should not go unpunished by the people (which is partly you).

Ps:
I had to fight hard against my urge to mention our your country and it’s glorious human right record.

Anyway: Why bring all this emotional, historical baggage into something that’s actually quite simple?The law isn’t always right, even if those to the right of us think so.

The corresponding value of money (or more accurately: the currency at hand) would drop.Wouldn’t help aforementioned anyone.

And who is they?I like conspiracy theorists, “they” always forget to get specific about their claims (lest one could check them).

The ultimate conspiracy theory: Things just are;)

Ps: Maybe “everyone” (whomever you mean by that) already is able to “earn” money on such a scale (provided not everyone does), but they just don’t do it.Equal chances don’t equal equal outcomes. Of course, 100% equal chances are not practically possible.

Add to this the ridiculous delays, and the fact that the process is plagued by childish jealousies and gossip. Often reviewers don’t even read carefully the articles that they are supposed to review, but there are two cases where they do read them very carefully: 1) when the paper is from a competitor whose prestige they want to destroy, 2) when they want to publish similar results first. We should never forget that scientists are people like everyone else.
This “pee review” process is broken beyond repair and introduces huge delays in the diffusion of scientific advances, which is a necessary per-requisite for new advances.

Re “an ocean of publications in which psychotic musings are presented alongside and on an equal footing with important works by dedicated scientists.”

Publish a paper on arXiv. If the paper is not good, it will be ignored. If it is good, it will be tweeted, shared on Facebook, picked by science news sites news sites and blogs, and other scientists will comment. This de-facto peer review after the publication, facilitated by modern Internet platforms like Stack Exchange, is much better than the obsolete traditional model and offers most of its advantages without most of its disadvantages.

Re “Can someone suggest an act of protest which would focus on the real culprit, and in which I could participate with a clear conscience?”

If you are a researcher, give your preference to open access journals and always publish on arXiv first. If you are a librarian, propose to cancel some subscriptions to pay-walled journals. If you are a taxpayer, remember that you _have already paid_ for state funded research, and it belongs to you, so support open access publishing and boycott pay-walls. Boycotts are the most effective means of protest, and they are totally legal.

The peer-review mechanism is supported by revenue generated from the “pay-wall” to which you refer. When you have destroyed the peer-review mechanism by depriving it of funds, will you rejoice? Is the blind acceptance of political fashion propelling us to a world of indiscriminate data?

In such a world you will be presented with an ocean of publications in which psychotic musings are presented alongside and on an equal footing with important works by dedicated scientists. Is this what you are striving toward? Is this the best use of your resources? Is this really what you want?

Psychological literature likens the effects of LSD to inducing a break-down of the lower-level filtering mechanisms of perception, resulting in a flood of indiscriminate data to the brain. Is this what you advocate? A publishing system of academic research based on induced schizophrenia?

Sure, peer-review has its flaws. It often initially rejects breakthrough ideas based on conformism and cognitive dissonance of the group. But are we supposed to advocate banding together in a mob mentality to throw out the baby with the bathwater?

Not to be contrary or detract from Aaron Swartz’s good works, but this seems like a bad idea to me.

I submit that academic publishing is not the real culprit in this unfortunate episode; it is a legal system gone out-of-control. Can someone suggest an act of protest which would focus on the real culprit, and in which I could participate with a clear conscience?

Thank you.

Science publishing is controlled by an entrenched mafia only interested in its own survival. It is now time to break this system. The best way to do so, as usual, is boycotting it. There are many good open access research journals, and I wish to encourage all researchers to use them instead of the pay-walled dinosaurs of the obsolete paper press. Your bosses will try to persuade you that publishing with the dinosaurs is more “prestigious,” but remember that your bosses are part of the problem.

3 years ago, when I was told I likely had less than 5 months to live because of metastasised melanoma, I spent many days scouring for information. Much of what I wanted to read was hidden behind $30 a time pay per view firewalls, and all of it was funded with public money.
I refused to pay.
I got enough information from free sources to work out an effective survival strategy (in the face of medical advice saying that no such thing was available).

I have since spent a lot of time investigating the nature of the incentive structures within our society that create such perverse outcomes for the majority of people, and I am now very clear that it is markets, and market valuation mechanisms (aka money) that are actually the single greatest threat to human survival at present.

All monetary systems (market based valuation systems) are scarcity based. The more scarce something is, the more valuable it is; and conversely the more abundant something is the less it is worth. This is completely contrary to the human need for abundance of basic survival commodities.

We have the technical ability to deliver such abundance of basic needs to every human (including information, knowledge and wisdom), but there is zero incentive within any economic system to do so (in fact significant incentives not to do so).

Thus Aaron’s death is something of a wake up call to many of us.
I only met him once, and I liked him very much.
I am greatly saddened by his death.

It is time for a concerted effort to move a majority of humanity beyond the paradigm of markets and market valuation.
It is time to reclaim the legal system to the public domain, and away from the market.
It is time to bring human values back to the law.
It is unlikely to be a smooth journey!