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Nicolas Alvarez <nic### [at] gmail com> wrote:
> Where did Warp say SUV drivers should be arrested? Why do you keep mixing
> "concentrate efforts" or "check ID" with "get arrested" in this discussion?
I think he is always talking in the context of that Arizona law that
allows police officers to physically arrest people.
I would like to repeat that I'm not defending that Arizona law. I'm not
advocating arresting people like that.
--
- Warp
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On 02/05/2010 8:49 PM, Darren New wrote:
> andrel wrote:
>> On 2-5-2010 20:20, Darren New wrote:
>>> Stephen wrote:
>>>> It is not the enforcing but the method of enforcement. That is what
>>>> whole argument is about.
>>>
>>> Hey, I know. We could get all the legal americans of central american
>>> decent to wear something sewn to their clothing to show they're
>>> legal, so the police would know not to bother them. ;-)
>>
>> Ah, a concealed Godwin. Well done.
>
> Concealed?
>
A yellow star, David. Oops sorry, Darren. ;-)
--
Best Regards,
Stephen
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Warp wrote:
> Your argument against "most illegal immigrants look mexican, so let's
> check the mexicans" is, basically "assume that somewhere 90% of citizens
> are of mexican descent". That somehow invalidates the claim? I don't get it.
There's no reason to check mexicans *unless* the ratio of illegal immigrants
that look mexican to legal residents that look mexican is especially high,
*and* the number of residents that look mexican is especially low.
> "Pointing out"? Maybe you are, but I just can't follow your logic.
It's simple math.
It's not more efficient to check 100,000 brown people, 1% of whom are
illegal, than it is to check 10,000 brown people who are actually suspected
of being illegal.
It's not more efficient to check the race with the highest absolute number
of illegal immigrants without regard to the number of legal immigrants.
It's simple math. Your claim that disallowing profiling makes the process
less efficient is factually incorrect.
>> Yes. But that's not what you suggested. You suggested checking in the ratios
>> of illegal immigrants of different backgrounds, not legal immigrants or
>> total residents of different backgounds.
>
> I was assuming a completely hypothetical ratio of 90% of illegal immigrants
> being mexican. Hence it makes sense to devote about 90% of resources to
> catching them. I really don't understand how the coincidence of 90% of the
> legal population of some place being of mexican descent refutes that idea.
Then you're missing the basic math.
> (Sure, my suggestion of devoting x% of resources for x% of illegals is
> cold, hard, inhuman math, and there are other more humanistic sides to the
> whole issue. I'm not denying that. I'm just arguing that from a resource
> distribution point of view it would make sense.)
A percentage is a ratio between two numbers. You don't have a simple
"percentage of illegals." Percentage of *what population* are illegals?
>> If someone said "The town is 70% brown and 30% white, so that's the ratio
>> we'll check in" then nobody would complain. But you're saying the "the
>> illegals are 70% brown and 30% white, so let's check in that ratio", which
>> is a different statement.
>
> Yes, I suppose I am saying that. You confused me with having the 90% of
> population being of mexican descent immediately after I gave an example of
> 90% of illegal immigrants looking like mexicans. I still don't understand
> what is it that your argument "proves".
It proves that the percentage of illegal immigrants who look mexican vs
percentage of illegal immigrants who don't look mexican tells you *nothing*
about the population of people you should be profiling. If you want to
catch more illegal immigrants by interviewing people without cause, you
*must* know more information than simply the percentages of illegals from
each country. You *also* have to know the percentages of legals from each
country.
>> I'm simply showing the flaw in your logic. You're suggested profiling
>> *fails* to improve the efficiency, unless you use more information to tune it.
>
> Am I understanding correctly that you are arguing against my math rather
> than against the basic idea I was expressing (in other words, to distribute
> resources according to illegal immigration country of origin distribution,
> regardless of whether that's seen as "racism" by some people)?
No. I'm saying that distributing resources according to illegal immigration
country of origin distribution *is* the flawed math. Your basic idea is
flawed because it's based on math that's flawed. I'm trying to point out how
the math is flawed and hence how the results of applying that math won't
have the effect you think it will.
> Out of curiosity: What *should* a police officer do, in your opinion, if
> he asks someone for their ID (or whatever proof of citizenship) and he has
> nothing to show?
It depends why he's asking you. If he stops you while you're driving and you
have no ID, he could do a number of things. He would normally take you to
the police station, book you (i.e., record your identifying information and
issue you a summons to appear in court to prove you have a driver's
license), and then call someone to come get you.
If he's asking you because he just wants to know, and you refuse, then he
should say "have a good day."
In some states, they've decided that you're required to tell the policeman
your name, but you don't have to prove it.
Same as if he comes to your door. If he says "May I come in?" and you say
"No," then he should stand outside and talk to you. If he has to *ask*, then
you get to say no. Makes perfect sense.
> I suppose I can't deny that sounds reasonable. Basically it means that
> illegal immigrants are not actively "hunted down", but if they try to
> actually *do* something they won't be able to if they can't prove they
> have the right to (as legal citizens or immigrants).
Exactly.
> Of course this assumes that nobody employs them without asking for their
> papers and without informing the authorities... I'm assuming that's one of
> the biggest problems in the US.
Yes. And it's already illegal to employ them without asking for their papers
and informing the authorities you've done so. (I.e., paying taxes on their
salaries, etc.) But police don't enforce *that* law, because it's the
*white* people who are making money by employing them. Actually, that law
*does* get enforced, which is how we know how many illegal immigrants are
here. But not everyone gets caught, because not every employer reports them,
and the fines for not reporting them are lower than the profit you make by
exploiting illegal immigrants.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.
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Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> Warp wrote:
>>> So all other types of criminal profiling are ok, but not profiling based
>>> on how someone looks like?
>
>> No. It's not legal to profile anyone before a crime has been committed.
>
> I don't think that's the case. There are all kinds of typical profiles
> of several types of criminals. For example "a serial killer is typically
> a white middle-aged male".
Having a statistical profile isn't the same as profiling someone. That sort
of profiling is used to reduce the number of people to consider *before* you
talk to people, not to *increase* the number of people you talk to about the
crime.
You wouldn't be allowed to go around and question every white middle-aged
male simply because there's a serial killer going around whacking people.
I don't know. What do you have against police having to have a reason to
think maybe you're doing something wrong before they stop and force you to
prove you're not? It really is more efficient that way.
>> Nobody minds being asked to show proof of citizenship if a crime has been
>> committed, or even if a crime *might* have been committed. This law isn't
>> that. This law is stopping people just in case maybe a crime has been committed.
>
> Maybe it's just me, but I really don't see a difference between "might
> have been" and "maybe has been"... You probably used poor wording for that.
By "might have been", I mean that if there's a reason to suspect you're
illegal and you prove you aren't, then a crime "might have been committed."
It wasn't, but there was some indication it might have been.
The second sentence is stopping people before you have any indication there
was a crime at all.
It's the difference between going door to door and questioning males if they
know anything about Mary being raped, after Mary reports being raped; vs
going door to door to ask each male to prove they haven't raped anyone. If
you want to go with your "profiling" comment.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.
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Warp wrote:
> I would like to repeat that I'm not defending that Arizona law. I'm not
> advocating arresting people like that.
Then what do you advocate, when police randomly stop someone with no reason
to believe they're illegal other than the color of their skin, and they ask
for proof of citizenship, and the person declines to show it?
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.
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Warp wrote:
> Well, I suppose people have the right to think that. I'm just wondering
> if that opinion comes from hard math or from political correctness.
I showed you the math. It's actually pretty well known.
>> It's not a matter of "offend some people." The people you're at risk of
>> offending are the majority of the people living where the law would be enforced.
>
> Well, it sounds to me like offending some people.
Except in a democracy, when you offend the majority of the people, often the
laws get changed.
> People often take their rights to privacy and freedom very seriously.
Rabidly so, here.
>>>> Randomly stopping people and asking them to prove their innocence.
>>> Apparently Britain is not one of those countries?
>
>> Apparently not.
>
> What I meant was if you oppose that law in Britain, and why.
I'm not familiar with all the laws, but yes, if you don't check everyone,
then don't check anyone.
>> Not here. It's illegal. Why? Because people who drive SUVs didn't want to
>> get randomly stopped just because 0.1% of the people driving SUVs might be
>> intoxicated.
>
> Is that so? Well, then that's something I don't agree with. I'm glad if
> this kind of police work reduces the risk of car accidents caused by drunken
> drivers. It increases my safety alongside everybody else's.
If it did, that would be a different story. But it doesn't.
If you stop people for driving drunk even when you can't tell they're drunk,
how does that reduce accidents?
>> It doesn't, and I explained why a couple of times.
> Then we'll have to disagree on this particular example.
You can disagree with simple baysian inference math, but you'd be wrong.
>> Basically, people here are generally against getting arrested before a cop
>> knows a crime has been committed at all.
>
> I'm not talking about arresting someone. I'm just talking about *checking*
> the alcohol levels of drivers.
That's being detained, at the least. We have this whole "innocent until
proven guilty" thing going on here. If there's *no* evidence you've done
anything wrong, why would you need to prove your innocence more than that?
Plus, you act like false positives are unheard of.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.
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On 02/05/2010 8:57 PM, Warp wrote:
>>>> > >> Randomly stopping people and asking them to prove their innocence.
>>> > >
>>> > > Apparently Britain is not one of those countries?
>> > Apparently not.
> What I meant was if you oppose that law in Britain, and why.
>
Our SUS laws are still on the statute books but they are restricted to a
declared area for up to six hours. The police normally cannot stop
Remember: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jyp1tyQ5s1A
--
Best Regards,
Stephen
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On 02/05/2010 7:38 PM, Darren New wrote:
>
> Hence, the whole "most illegal immigrants look mexican, so let's check
> the mexicans" is a flawed argument.
How do you know that they are Mexican? They could be American born in
the USA whose parents were born in the USA.
--
Best Regards,
Stephen
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Warp wrote:
> Well, I suppose people have the right to think that. I'm just wondering
> if that opinion comes from hard math or from political correctness.
Oh, also, if you predominantly check mexican-looking people, you will
predominantly arrest mexican-looking people. Which means it will seem like
the predominant illegal immigrant is mexican. Which is another way you screw
up the math. You do not, by definition, know how many actual illegal
immigrants there are of which types.
You can argue that it *logically* makes sense that most illegal immigrants
on the mexican border will be mexican. But this turns into a positive
feedback loop.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.
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Stephen wrote:
> On 02/05/2010 7:38 PM, Darren New wrote:
>>
>> Hence, the whole "most illegal immigrants look mexican, so let's check
>> the mexicans" is a flawed argument.
>
> How do you know that they are Mexican? They could be American born in
> the USA whose parents were born in the USA.
Well, yes. I was using "mexicans" to mean "people who look mexican" in that
sentence. Since I already pointed out that your immigration status can
change based on factors completely irrelevant to your appearance, I figured
that was already understood.
--
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
Linux: Now bringing the quality and usability of
open source desktop apps to your personal electronics.
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