Re: CRIME Kudos to Acting Police Chief Andrew Kirkland

From: Crispin Cowan (crispin@private)
Date: Mon Nov 26 2001 - 23:56:48 PST

  • Next message: Ken Emmons: "RE: CRIME Kudos to Acting Police Chief Andrew Kirkland"

    Andrew Plato wrote:
    
    >Ron_Deming@private wrote: 
    >
    >>A newspaper
    >>columnist summed it up pretty well recently:  "A rattlesnake 
    >>in the living room tends to end all discussion of animal rights."
    >>
    >Speaking metaphorically...
    >
    I was taught in college not to speak metaphorically. More specifically, 
    not to *reason* metaphorically. This is because it is all too easy to 
    construct an entirely bogus argument that sounds good. For an analogical 
    argument to be valid, you must (emphasize "must") show that the subject 
    (civil rights) share the property in question (requirement for due 
    process) with the analogy (animal rights). Near as I can tell, animal 
    rights does not have any notion of due process, so the above 
    "rattlesnake" argument is a devilishly persuasive load of crap :-)
    
    For an amusing example of how bogus an analogy can be, check out the 
    Monty Python's Oscar Wilde Sketch. "His Majesty is like a stream of 
    bat's piss."   
    http://www.geocities.com/TelevisionCity/8889/poetry/mp-wilde.htm
    
    So, bringing it home to secure network design :-) it's ok to use 
    analogies for inspiration or explanation, but be sure that your 
    arguments actually hold up without the analogy.
    
    Crispin
    
    -- 
    Crispin Cowan, Ph.D.
    Chief Scientist, WireX Communications, Inc. http://wirex.com
    Security Hardened Linux Distribution:       http://immunix.org
    Available for purchase: http://wirex.com/Products/Immunix/purchase.html
    



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