Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!rice!news
From: wruss00@ricevm1.rice.edu (William R. Russell, Jr.)
Newsgroups: comp.org.eff.talk
Subject: Re: Public Access Sites -- concerns, problems, and precedents
Keywords: feynman
Message-ID: <1991Jun19.145311.28713@rice.edu>
Date: 19 Jun 91 14:53:11 GMT
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In article <1399@zinn.MV.COM> mem@zinn.MV.COM (Mark E. Mallett) writes:
...
>Richard Feynman ("surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman!") told many
>stories of his mischeivous nature.  In one, while at Los Alamos, he
>made it a habit to surrepticiously steal combinations to all of the
>locked files, safes, and so forth, during the atom bomb project.  If
>that were now, and he told the story, would he remain a free man?
>
>-mm-

As a side note here, Richard Feynman *only* used that knowledge when he
was asked. Typically, some scientist would be away on vacation, and
they would come running to Feynman and ask something like "Help! We need 
the calculations for the oscillation overthruster from Harvey's office!".

Feynman would then go into his office to get his "tools" (i.e. look up
the combination which he noticed Harvey use a month before), return to
Harvey's office, sit there for a while and drink coffee (with the door
closed), then come out an hour later with the safe/file/desk unlocked.

(Actually, in retrospect, Feynman did use his abilities to play a joke
once... but hardly anything serious. In that case, he didn't even steal
the combination beforehand, he just guessed it, right off the top of his
head. Of course, these are in Feynman's own words, so who knows if he 
actually was a spy... bwahaha.)

Anyway, the *point* of all this is that Feynman didn't break the law. He
didn't steal anything, and he didn't copy anything and give it to foreign
agents. Granted, if he were working on a government project today and
claimed to know all of the passwords for a certain computer system, he
would probably be reprimanded. But imprisoned? What law has been broken?
(Granted, I wouldn't put it past the government to imprison someone based
on means alone, excluding motive or opportunity.)

It comes to the same old argument: can you convict someone for possession
of the lockpick, even if they don't commit burglarly? Is it ethical to 
make lockpick possession illegal?

>-- 
>Mark E. Mallett  Zinn Computer Co/ PO Box 4188/ Manchester NH/ 03103 
>Bus. Phone: 603 645 5069    Home: 603 424 8129     BIX: mmallett
>uucp: mem@zinn.MV.COM  (  ...{decvax|elrond|harvard}!zinn!mem   )
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Rick Russell
wruss00@ricevm1.rice.edu

The opinions expressed here are exclusively my own.