Ricochet is the best place on the internet to discuss the issues of the day, either through commenting on posts or writing your own for our active and dynamic community in a fully moderated environment. In addition, the Ricochet Audio Network offers over 50 original podcasts with new episodes released every day.
One response to stepped-up surveillance is stepped-up effort to hide from it — more laws regulating what people and governments are allowed to record, and more funds devoted to encryption and other privacy-protecting resources. But author and scientist David Brin says while this approach reflects the right instincts, it is insufficient. Especially as technology advances, there will be no hiding from surveillance. What we should instead fight for is transparency: the watchers must feel just as exposed as the watched.
Dr. Brin anticipated this debate with his 1998 book, “The Transparent Society,” which he joined me to discuss. We also talked about what privacy policy means when applied to the government versus the increasingly powerful tech titans, the future of AI, and lessons from science fiction. David Brin holds a PhD in astrophysics, and besides writing “The Transparent Society” is also the prize-winning author of several science fiction novels. His blog can be found here, and essays and speeches touched upon in this episode here, here, and here.
Subscribe to Political Economy with James Pethokoukis in Apple Podcasts (and leave a 5-star review, please!), or by RSS feed. For all our podcasts in one place, subscribe to the Ricochet Audio Network Superfeed in Apple Podcasts or by RSS feed.
A decent podcast but please don’t take the advice of the guest to contribute to the ACLU thinking you are supporting free speech. They have devolved into a pro-abortion and generally leftist group where free speech takes a distant second.