Re: Eggs at Customs (fwd)

At 11:36 PM 1/15/96, Lindsay Haisley wrote:
>There has (fortunately!) been a big crackdown recently on the illegal pet
>bird import trade, something akin to the slave trade of the 19th century for
>those of us who like pet birds.  One of the methods people use to import
>birds is to wear special vests full of pockets for rare bird eggs.  If the
>person who wrote this was coming in from SE Asia, especially Australia, then
>this was very possibly the meaning of the question.

Yes, Cliff Stoll described how this plot was hatched in his book "The
Cuckoo's Egg."

(This was a yolk, folks. I stoll it.)

P.S. I am persuaded that the importation of rare tropical birds into the
U.S. is a GOOD THING, and that the attempts to ban such imports are
misguided eco-fundie efforts. Diversity will be enhanced by having the
birds in the U.S., and if left in their native jungles, most will die
anyway. Better a pampered tropical bird in a gilded cage than lunch for
some predator, or starvation as the jungles are cleared by slash-and-burn
farmers.

The same data transparency of borders, where truckloads of stuff come in
easily, means that truckloads of birds, eggs, embryos, babies, etc. can
also make it in. Most such shipments are only caught when surveillance
yields a shipping schedule...such surveillance is becoming more and more
difficult because of the technologies we push.

--Tim May

We got computers, we're tapping phone lines, we know that that ain't allowed.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^756839 - 1  | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."

On Mon, 15 Jan 1996, Timothy C. May wrote:

> At 11:36 PM 1/15/96, Lindsay Haisley wrote:
> >There has (fortunately!) been a big crackdown recently on the illegal pet
> >bird import trade, something akin to the slave trade of the 19th century for
> >those of us who like pet birds.  One of the methods people use to import
> >birds is to wear special vests full of pockets for rare bird eggs.
> 
> Yes, Cliff Stoll described how this plot was hatched in his book "The
> Cuckoo's Egg."
> 
> (This was a yolk, folks. I stoll it.)

For that you must be punished.
 
> P.S. I am persuaded that the importation of rare tropical birds into the
> U.S. is a GOOD THING, and that the attempts to ban such imports are
> misguided eco-fundie efforts. Diversity will be enhanced by having the
> birds in the U.S., and if left in their native jungles, most will die
> anyway. Better a pampered tropical bird in a gilded cage than lunch for
> some predator, or starvation as the jungles are cleared by slash-and-burn
> farmers.

Scientifically invalid. Releasing non-native species can really wreck an
ecosystem because of the lack of evolved countermeasures. See kudzu weeds
in the South, or the Mediterranean fruit fly in California, or pigs and
sheep on tropical islands, or humans with big brains and opposable thumbs
anywhere but Africa. The better engineered solution would be to feed the
slash-and-burn farmers some other way. 

Kind of analogous to an engineer like Paul Kocher taking a hard look at
crypto systems that had only been analyzed by pure mathematicians. You 
need to feed the sniffers real entropy, not just highly evolved math.

-rich

Well, who is a non-native?   If it walked across the Bering Sea land 
bridge a few thousand years ago, does it have a higher moral value than 
if it hopped a ride on the bilges of a cargo ship in 1957?

If you want to isolate the rainforest until mankind has had time to 
completely inventory all the species and test them to see if they are the 
next cure for malaria or an exploitable raw material, well, now you have 
my sympathy.


Alan Horowitz
alanh@norfolk.infi.net

On Mon, 15 Jan 1996, Alan Horowitz wrote:

> Well, who is a non-native?   If it walked across the Bering Sea land 
> bridge a few thousand years ago, does it have a higher moral value than 
> if it hopped a ride on the bilges of a cargo ship in 1957?

Morality has nothing to do with it. It's the speed of the evolution. If
you walk across the straits, the system has the time to react and restore
a dynamic equilibrium. If you immediately release a new species with no
natural predators, the system is shattered, and it might not survive. 
This is not to say that ecosystems and societies are static -- they evolve
constantly, displaying unpredictable punctuated equilibrium (Steven J.
Gould was right, Edmund Burke and Karl Marx were wrong).

Usually, the mutations (in biology or politics) are minor, and almost
always, they are localized.

Large-scale catastrophes like a meteor hitting the earth and killing all
the dinosours (or whatever happened), or nuclear war, or whatever, are
larger punctuation than normal. Sometimes the ecosystem recovers,
sometimes a completely new ecosystem forms, sometimes all life but the
cockroaches is wiped out. 

Politically and morally, I'm a follower of the realist school (Morgenthau
et al). It is right for the US to dominate the world because it has the
most power. On the level of international relations, it doesn't matter how
it got that way; trying to reverse the power realities would be like
trying to dam the Pacific Ocean. Of course, in specific cases in the
present, we can make moral choices, and if we feel like it, we can help
out the present victims of historical "immorality" (like the fact that the
descendants of slaves weren't born into the same inheritance as the
descendants of the Carnegies and Vanderbilts). 

> If you want to isolate the rainforest until mankind has had time to 
> completely inventory all the species and test them to see if they are the 
> next cure for malaria or an exploitable raw material, well, now you have 
> my sympathy.

Sympathy is the wrong emotion for both politics and science, but then,
what you're talking about isn't sympathy. 

Cute cuddly seals and frieldly dolphins and teddy bears get "sympathy"
among mainstrean "environmentalists," and the Sierra Club and World
Wildlife Federation calendars raise a lot of money, but it's the plants
and bugs and bacteria that are really important. Elephants and blue whales
look big and important to us, but they're really inconsequential in the
larger scheme of biodiversity. They could go extinct and the planet
doesn't really care. But kill the blue-green algae and the trees, and
we're all dead. 

-rich

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- From the node of Timothy C. May:
: 
: P.S. I am persuaded that the importation of rare tropical birds into the
: U.S. is a GOOD THING, and that the attempts to ban such imports are
: misguided eco-fundie efforts. Diversity will be enhanced by having the
: birds in the U.S., and if left in their native jungles, most will die
: anyway. Better a pampered tropical bird in a gilded cage than lunch for
: some predator, or starvation as the jungles are cleared by slash-and-burn
: farmers.

Aside from the amusing belief that caged life is preferrable, let me point
out that importation of species can be pretty nasty.  Zebra mussels in the
Great Lakes, Mongooses in Hawaii, those nasty snakes from Guam ... etc, etc.


: 
: The same data transparency of borders, where truckloads of stuff come in
: easily, means that truckloads of birds, eggs, embryos, babies, etc. can
: also make it in. Most such shipments are only caught when surveillance
: yields a shipping schedule...such surveillance is becoming more and more
: difficult because of the technologies we push.

All right!  Horseman #5 ... the bird smuggler ;)



PS -- Going to consolidate posts here.  Can someone recommend a good 
text for an intro to Number Theory?


- -----
Mark Rogaski           100,000 lemmings     rogaski@pobox.com 
aka Doc, wendigo        can't be wrong!     http://www.pobox.com/~rogaski/

VMS is as secure as a poodle encased in a block of lucite 
						... about as useful, too.

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> 
> PS -- Going to consolidate posts here.  Can someone recommend a good 
> text for an intro to Number Theory?

I've been reading "Number Theory and it's History" by Oystein Ore (1948, 
reprinted by Dover books, $9.95). It's old, but it's understandable to a 
computist like me, and if it's in print after 58 years, it can't be bad :)

Simon

On Tue, 16 Jan 1996, Mark Rogaski wrote:

> PS -- Going to consolidate posts here.  Can someone recommend a good 
> text for an intro to Number Theory?

My school's using Elementary Number Theory and Its Applications 3rd edition
(I think it is just out) by Kenneth H. Rosen, Addison-Wesley, it seems to 
cover a bit of crypto and the latest improvements in factoring. For more 
crypto orientation, Schneier recommends A Course in Number Theory and 
Cryptography 2nd ed, Neal Koblitz, Springer-Verlag, 1994. The intro to
number theory is more of a review, but the crypto part kicks in after 
page 54 and spans the rest of the book. Getting your Num Theory from Rosen
and your crypto from Koblitz is a good bet, as your local university 
library's likely to have both (mine had both 2nd eds, just picked 'em up as
a matter of coincidence).

Rosen seems to be one of those "standard textbooks" (we're using his Discrete
Math text too) and as for Koblitz, books by Springer have extremely high 
chances of turning up in universities. (It's in the yellow Grad Texts in Math
series, not the familiar silver Lecture Notes in CS series)

[ Dear Perry, this is CYPHERpunks, not WHINERpunks.  Please resist
  the temptation to flame me for being off-topic since flaming for
  being off-topic is just as off-topic as this is.		   ]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----

To: Mark Rogaski <wendigo@pobox.com>
cc: Cypherpunks <cypherpunks@toad.com>
Subject: Better diversity through cages (?!)
In-reply-to: Mark Rogaski's message of "Tue, 16 Jan 1996 00:58:49 EST."
             <m0tc4Px-000jQZC@gti.gti.net> 

    Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 00:58:49 -0500 (EST)
    From: Mark Rogaski <wendigo@pobox.com>
    
    - From the node of Timothy C. May:
    : 
    : Diversity will be enhanced by having the birds in the U.S., and
    : if left in their native jungles, most will die anyway. Better a
    : pampered tropical bird in a gilded cage than lunch for some
    : predator, or starvation as the jungles are cleared by
    : slash-and-burn farmers.
    
    Aside from the amusing belief that caged life is preferrable, let
    me point out that importation of species can be pretty nasty.
    Zebra mussels in the Great Lakes, Mongooses in Hawaii, those nasty
    snakes from Guam ... etc, etc.

Good point.  If you view nature as a market system of survival
capital, trying to seriously alter it rather than just living off of
it is asking for trouble.  This is true for command economy
governments, slash-and-burn farmers, and species importers.  Nature
(the market) will continue, but the meddlers (humans) are risking
their chance to be players.

Two more reasons why the better-diversity-through-cages
is weak:

 - many (most?) species tend not to reproduce in captivity.
 - most illegal imported animals die in transit.

The tropical bird has better odds of survival against the predator and
starvation than it has against smugglers and gilded cage operators.
If you consider the odds of reproducing, they're *much* better with
the predator and starvation than with the smugglers and cagers.

			Rick

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--
Rick Busdiecker                        Please do not send electronic junk mail!
 net: rfb@lehman.com or rfb@cmu.edu    PGP Public Key: 0xDBD9994D
 www: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/afs/cs.cmu.edu/user/rfb/http/home.html
 send mail, subject "send index" for mailbot info, "send pgp key" gets my key
A `hacker' is one who writes code.  Breaking into systems is `cracking'.

Rick Busdiecker writes:
> [ Dear Perry, this is CYPHERpunks, not WHINERpunks.  Please resist
>   the temptation to flame me for being off-topic since flaming for
>   being off-topic is just as off-topic as this is.		   ]

Sorry, but no.

If you know that your posting is off topic, you shouldn't be posting
it, period. Reply in private or some such. The S to N ratio in these
parts is dropping rapidly, and its largely the fault of people who
think "just one more off topic post can't hurt". One person doing it
causes little damage, but unfortunately dozens upon dozens feel the
urge every day.

I usually just reply to such posts in private and note that they are
off topic, but since you insisted on bringing it up in public...

Perry

Date: Tue, 16 Jan 1996 12:45:03 -0500
    From: "Perry E. Metzger" <perry@piermont.com>
    
    
    Rick Busdiecker writes:
    > [ Dear Perry, this is CYPHERpunks, not WHINERpunks.  Please resist
    >   the temptation to flame me for being off-topic since flaming for
    >   being off-topic is just as off-topic as this is.		   ]
    
    Sorry, but no.

Then either you must think that this *is* WHINERpunks, or you are a
hypocrit.
    
    I usually just reply to such posts in private and note that they are
    off topic, but since you insisted on bringing it up in public...

Well, you sure post a hell of a lot of them to the list.

			Rick

(Sorry Perry, I just couldn't resist :-> )

On Tue, 16 Jan 1996, Perry E. Metzger wrote:

> Sorry, but no.
> 
> If you know that your posting is off topic, you shouldn't be posting
> it, period. Reply in private or some such. The S to N ratio in these
> parts is dropping rapidly, and its largely the fault of people who
> think "just one more off topic post can't hurt". One person doing it
> causes little damage, but unfortunately dozens upon dozens feel the
> urge every day.
			What is a toad machine? 

In the spirit of John's evolutionary programming post, I submit that
cypherpunks and all its components (on topic posts, jya's news reports, sheer
paranoia, clueless newbies wanting to join or leave, Klaus! VFP, flamewars, 
perryflames...) constitute a dynamic and evolving optimizing computational 
(enough fuzzy words for you?) system of which we are the calculators. 

Think of toad.com as an input/output box to interface us cells(not to 
mention a strange attractor for every cook on the net). We have a 
topic (or goal) of cryptography and anonymity, codewriters to give us 
something other than politics to talk about, a persistent random noise 
function to increase diversity, and Perry as a factor of noise limitation.
Obviously massively parallel. Is this a genetic algorithm, a semantic net,
or some other model? I dunno. As I hear the *plonking* sound of killfiles 
closing in on me and my inane post, I wonder...where will it go?
A topic for further study.

;-)

Can't we just solve the problem by making it a moderated list; 
and make Perry the moderator?

-- 
A host is a host from coast to coast.................wb8foz@nrk.com
& no one will talk to a host that's close........[v].(301) 56-LINUX
Unless the host (that isn't close).........................pob 1433
is busy, hung or dead....................................20915-1433

On Tue, 16 Jan 1996, David Lesher wrote:

> Can't we just solve the problem by making it a moderated list; 
> and make Perry the moderator?
> 

SHIT NO!  NO NO NO NO NO!  NO WAY IN HELL NO!  :)  Cypherpunks will NOT 
be moderated.  Filtered, spindled and stapled, but never moderated.

==========================================================================
 + ^ + |  Ray Arachelian | Amerika: The land of the Freeh. |   _ |>
  \|/  |sunder@dorsai.org| Where day by day, yet another   |   \ |
<--+-->|                 | Constitutional right vanishes.  |    \|
  /|\  |    Just Say     |                                 |    <|\
 + v + | "No" to the NSA!| Jail the censor, not the author!|    <| n
===================http://www.dorsai.org/~sunder/=========================

On Tue, 16 Jan 1996, David Lesher wrote:

> Can't we just solve the problem by making it a moderated list; 
> and make Perry the moderator?

  There are moderated versions of the list, I think cypherpunks-lite is one 
of them. You have to pay for the privilege. IMHO noise is self-regulating 
on mailing lists (as opposed to usenet). My preferred method of accessing
cypherpunks is through news://nntp.hks.net/hks.* ,which also gets you a few
other worthwhile related lists (like cyberia-l, ipsec, mixmaster...).
All the benefits of being a newsgroup without having to be on usenet.

  I am only currently subscribed directly because it is the beginning of 
the term and I can afford the time. I subscribe and unsubscribe several times
a year as time constraints permit. I think this is far preferable to having
the raw master list edited according to someone's tastes. You get the flavour
you prefer. Killfiles exist.

  It is a tribute to the usefullness of the forum and the flexibility of the
medium that there are so many ways of accessing this source of info.

Back to your regularly scheduled crypto.

(Speaking of sublists, whatever happenned to the DC-net list mentioned in 
the cyphernomicon? Is this a figment of my imagination or was there any code
written that I might partake of? Btw, why call it a DC network when it is 
really a ring? Maybe I haven't taken a good enough look at the protocol.
Dinner calls. :> )