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Stuart_Armstrong comments on Research interests I don't currently have time to develop alone - Less Wrong Discussion
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Can we avoid mentioning 1984 in surveillance discussions? I've encountered many anti-surveillance arguments that eventually boiled down to "1984 is scary". But 1984 was a work of fiction, and as far as predictions go, it was wrong all over the place.
I want to be able to phrase good anti-surveillance arguments that people will find just as valid as if 1984 had never been written.
The point of mentioning 1984 isn't to use it as a study or a forecast. The point is reaction to the world depicted in it: most people find totalitarian, total-surveillance societies undesirable, disturbing, and basically evil.
1984 is also useful as a well-known reference. If someone says "I have nothing to hide, I don't need privacy" you can ask him whether he'd be fine with the levels of surveillance depicted in 1984. He might say "yes, I don't care", he might say "no, that's too much", he might say "only in a democratic society", etc.
But would you be fine with Bentham's Panopticon, for example? Are examples of Soviet Russia, Eastern Germany, etc. OK?