From: shamrock@netcom.com (Lucky Green)
Date: Sun, 8 Oct 95 13:22:12 PDT
To: cypherpunks@toad.com
Subject: Re: NSA Realists v. Nuts
Message-ID: <199510082019.QAA15164@book.hks.net>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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In article <199510071424.AA00279@october.ducktown.org>,
mkj@october.ducktown.org wrote:

> Need I point out that pride in one's work is not necessarily exclusive
> of evil?  Rarely does anyone actually think of themselves as evil --
> and those few who do are usually just harmless nuts.  The most evil
> and destructive people throughout history have always thought of
> themselves as good people, doing good work.

Let me illustrate this with an example. During my visit to Dachau
Concentration Camp, I saw original lab notebooks of experiments designed
to increase the survial rate of pilots downed above the cold waters of the
North Sea. A noble cause.

The notebooks contained pages upon pages of tables listing survial times
vs. water temperature, the data gained by dropping subjects into a tub
containing water of a defined temperature.

I them saw more tables of the effects of various methods investigated to
revive hypothermia victims who were near death. One of the treatments
under investigation was dropping the patient into boiling water. Surely
this type of research falls under the category of evil.

But the scientists that conducted the study would not have thought so.
They believed that they did a favor to humanity. The fact that to this day
the treatment of hypothermia is based upon the results of this study,
saving the lives of thousands of patients over the decades past, would
surely - in the experimenters' minds - have vindicated their gruesome
deeds.

Ponder this,
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