Yeah, I don’t have a good answer for you there. One thing I’d like to put forward is that, more often than you might think, social factors in making this sort of decision (“am I interested in this religion”) can reasonably outweigh any doubts about the well-foundedness of the religion itself, even for people who are in general critical thinkers.
Cf. FSF-advocates, of which a good number exist, who have signed up to an ethos that says that proprietary software is unethical and simply wrong (http://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html); which ethos, in this respect, is false, and disrespectful of the rights and freedom of the people who write proprietary software. Now, over the last few years, I’ve worked (remotely, online) with a good number of them, and they’re often smart, passionate, and engaged. I’ve enjoyed it.
From this enjoyment, I can see the attraction of signing up for the FSF ethos, to better integrate into the club, and I suspect this is, deep down, the reason for the allegiance of many to the organisation, rather than that they’re convinced in detail that it’s right.
I'm slightly confused by your use of the FSF analogy. Your comment reads as if it's completely obvious that the FSF ethos is wrong and bad; that may be completely obvious to you, but it's a long step from there to concluding that all or most people who subscribe to it must be doing so for reasons other than their conviction of its rightness!
(I don't subscribe to the FSF's viewpoint myself; my free software politics are strongly aligned with the MIT/BSD axis rather than the GNU GPL axis. Nonetheless I don't find it obvious that the FSF is wrong; I had to stop and think about it for a while before forming my opinion.)
Sorry, I’m often conscious that people tend not to read scads of text, so
I over-edit what I say, to the detriment of its clarity. Particularly a bad choice in responding to someone who just wrote scads of text on the nature of religion in a Livejournal post.
I didn’t say the FSF was bad; I said its ethos was wrong, in at least
that one aspect. I should have gone on to say that no-one is hurt by the
existence of proprietary software, no-one is deprived of something they had
already, and that software being proprietary has had benefits in areas like
internationalisation, GUIs, and overall consistency that haven’t been
practical with decentralised development by people working mainly through
English, via the command line, with very strong individual opinions on how
software should behave. “Unethical and simply wrong” is false.
Now, as I say, lots of the people who’ve signed up for the project are
smart, passionate, and engaged. Smart, passionate, engaged people are never
totally oblivious to details like this, by definition, especially not after
years of engagement. I do not propose that they are wilfully ignoring a
judgement that something is wrong; rather that they enjoy being part of the
club, with good reason, and as a result don’t question its foundations with
an independent clarity.
I think you're oversimplifying by insisting on seeing the issue from the point of view of harm as deprivation of things. As I understand the FSF's viewpoint, what's been lost is freedom. Specifically, the freedom to solve problems in a natural way sitting at your computer, by using the most appropriate combination of software and data to achieve a desired goal. The existence of proprietary software and arcane copyright restrictions means that when I sit and think about solutions to a problem, I have to evaluate every one in terms of its legality as well as its technical feasibility, and some courses of action which do not harm anybody in all the senses you list are nonetheless illegal.
Now the FSF will see that as a fundamental injustice whereas I see it as an annoying inconvenience. But it is something which is a restriction on the things I can do and the ways in which I can solve the problems that confront me on a day-to-day basis, and it is something which would not be there if it weren't for software copyright, so it is something you have to weigh up against the putative benefits, and although you might reasonably disagree with the FSF's conclusion that the benefits are not as large as they look and the loss of freedom is more important, I don't think you can reasonably consider it to be obviously false to anyone considering the issue with "an independent clarity".
I would point out that the existence of copyright for books means that some
courses of action which do not harm anybody in the senses listed are
nonetheless illegal, but Stallman doesn’t argue against copyright for books
with anything like the vehemence he does for software.
The “freedom” thing, as the FSF argues it, is not honest, IMO. They
resolutely fail to admit that the individual user of the BSD- or MIT-licensed software
has more freedom than the user of the GPL. That the user can turn
that freedom to ends that are not what the FSF would like, well, something
similar has always been the consequence of actual freedom. If you’re a
country and you open your borders, you run the risk of your best and
brightest leaving to earn more money elsewhere; if you end prohibition of
alcohol and gambling, you run more risk of having inveterate gamblers and
alcoholics in your population.
Now, yes, the freedom of which the GPL deprives the user should be
balanced against the freedom it grants; but they don’t even start. Whence,
IMO, the dishonesty.
I’m going to shut up on this now, because I’ve thought it through already
to my satisfaction, and I really dislike trying to get into Stallman’s frame
of mind, both in reading his opinions on society and his Lisp and emacs
documentation. I find him inarticulate, unclear and so often just wrong (“Of
course C-h should be the primary documented way to invoke help! What, you
say that every terminal in the world sends C-h for backspace? Then every
terminal in the world should change! C-h for help makes perfect sense!”)
that the effort versus the benefit rarely works out.
But, yeah, I accept that my example was badly chosen. I suppose it’s a
symptom of my having talked about it with a limited number of people, so my
appreciation of how other people understand it is not that complete.
I have a sudden interest here in why you think I believed the FSF bad. Do you think the Church of England bad because several of their basic tenets are wrong?
I'm even more baffled now. You said the FSF ethos was wrong. I paraphrased that statement in response, saying that I thought you thought that the FSF ethos was wrong, because I thought that's what you said. Why are you now asking me to defend the claim that the FSF ethos is wrong? I never said I thought it! I said I thought you thought it.
It is what I said. I distinguish between "bad" (in this context, "net negative for the world, morally objectionable") and "wrong" (i.t.c "incorrect") and you appear not to, which is reasonable enough.
Ah, I see; none of this sidetrack would have arisen if I hadn't thoughtlessly said "wrong and bad". I'm sorry about that. It's a sort of stock phrase among some people I know, used without much thought. (Though also, after you said "disrespectful of the rights and freedom of [a group of] people", I don't think it's too unreasonable to be left with the impression you thought the thing thus described was a bad thing!)
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Cf. FSF-advocates, of which a good number exist, who have signed up to an ethos that says that proprietary software is unethical and simply wrong (http://www.gnu.org/gnu/thegnuproject.html); which ethos, in this
respect, is false, and disrespectful of the rights and freedom of the people who write proprietary software. Now, over the last few years, I’ve worked (remotely, online) with a good number of them, and they’re often smart,
passionate, and engaged. I’ve enjoyed it.
From this enjoyment, I can see the attraction of signing up for the FSF ethos, to better integrate into the club, and I suspect this is, deep down, the reason for the allegiance of many to the organisation, rather than that they’re convinced in detail that it’s right.
(I don't subscribe to the FSF's viewpoint myself; my free software politics are strongly aligned with the MIT/BSD axis rather than the GNU GPL axis. Nonetheless I don't find it obvious that the FSF is wrong; I had to stop and think about it for a while before forming my opinion.)
Have I misunderstood you?
Sorry, I’m often conscious that people tend not to read scads of text, so I over-edit what I say, to the detriment of its clarity. Particularly a bad choice in responding to someone who just wrote scads of text on the nature of religion in a Livejournal post.
I didn’t say the FSF was bad; I said its ethos was wrong, in at least that one aspect. I should have gone on to say that no-one is hurt by the existence of proprietary software, no-one is deprived of something they had already, and that software being proprietary has had benefits in areas like internationalisation, GUIs, and overall consistency that haven’t been practical with decentralised development by people working mainly through English, via the command line, with very strong individual opinions on how software should behave. “Unethical and simply wrong” is false.
Now, as I say, lots of the people who’ve signed up for the project are smart, passionate, and engaged. Smart, passionate, engaged people are never totally oblivious to details like this, by definition, especially not after years of engagement. I do not propose that they are wilfully ignoring a judgement that something is wrong; rather that they enjoy being part of the club, with good reason, and as a result don’t question its foundations with an independent clarity.
Now the FSF will see that as a fundamental injustice whereas I see it as an annoying inconvenience. But it is something which is a restriction on the things I can do and the ways in which I can solve the problems that confront me on a day-to-day basis, and it is something which would not be there if it weren't for software copyright, so it is something you have to weigh up against the putative benefits, and although you might reasonably disagree with the FSF's conclusion that the benefits are not as large as they look and the loss of freedom is more important, I don't think you can reasonably consider it to be obviously false to anyone considering the issue with "an independent clarity".
I would point out that the existence of copyright for books means that some courses of action which do not harm anybody in the senses listed are nonetheless illegal, but Stallman doesn’t argue against copyright for books with anything like the vehemence he does for software.
The “freedom” thing, as the FSF argues it, is not honest, IMO. They resolutely fail to admit that the individual user of the BSD- or MIT-licensed software has more freedom than the user of the GPL. That the user can turn that freedom to ends that are not what the FSF would like, well, something similar has always been the consequence of actual freedom. If you’re a country and you open your borders, you run the risk of your best and brightest leaving to earn more money elsewhere; if you end prohibition of alcohol and gambling, you run more risk of having inveterate gamblers and alcoholics in your population.
Now, yes, the freedom of which the GPL deprives the user should be balanced against the freedom it grants; but they don’t even start. Whence, IMO, the dishonesty.
I’m going to shut up on this now, because I’ve thought it through already to my satisfaction, and I really dislike trying to get into Stallman’s frame of mind, both in reading his opinions on society and his Lisp and emacs documentation. I find him inarticulate, unclear and so often just wrong (“Of course C-h should be the primary documented way to invoke help! What, you say that every terminal in the world sends C-h for backspace? Then every terminal in the world should change! C-h for help makes perfect sense!”) that the effort versus the benefit rarely works out.
But, yeah, I accept that my example was badly chosen. I suppose it’s a symptom of my having talked about it with a limited number of people, so my appreciation of how other people understand it is not that complete.
I have a sudden interest here in why you think I believed the FSF bad. Do
you think the Church of England bad because several of their basic tenets
are wrong?