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Comment by anamax | Hacker News Reader

And if this guy isn't Satoshi?

And if he comes to harm as a result of someone believing the NYT?

Come now, don't be absurd. The NYTimes has hard hitting evidence to back up their accusation, like "He shifted in his seat when asked about this."

Then the person who harmed him will be prosecuted. And life will go on.

The NY Times isn’t calling for violence.

Harm from exposure can take a lot of shapes and sizes that go beyond the physical and the potential prosecution that someone may be held accountable I find weak.

> Then the person who harmed him will be prosecuted ... NY Times isn’t calling for violence.

And the negligent driver also didn't mean to cause injury, yet we have laws on negligent driving.

If the NY Times would have known that harm could come to someone by having information published, they should consult and/or take measures to prevent that harm (or at least, take measures to minimize it).

The negligent driver was driving the vehicle though. The NY Times writer isn’t holding Back hostage and holding a knife to his throat nor indicating anyone should do that. Your metaphor is nonsense.

And yet they would be responsible.

How? Knowing who Satoshi is, is a great thing. Don’t create a diety out of the pseudonym.

Consider the following hypothetical: you have a safe in your home with a substantial sum of money in it, and you consider its presence, the location and contents private knowledge. However, someone uses publicly available information to infer the rough location and contents of your safe and makes it public. You are robbed shortly after. What percentage of responsibility lies with that person?

Alternatively, you don't even have that money, the journalists hallucinated the whole thing, so when the home invader breaks in and starts torturing you, there's literally nothing you can do to save yourself as they cut off pieces of you little by little.

But don't worry, they'll definitely solve this crime, because the clearance rate for impersonal crimes that don't involve family, friends or business associates is famously high. ...oh wait.

Responsibility is entirely your own fault for letting the “someone” know of your safe and it’s value. Do you know in America most gun safes are kept unlocked? Most gun safes are rather large too, hard to hide. Why doesn’t chaos ensue when this fact is known? Someone COULD go an steal all the guns and use the guns to kill everyone then rob everyone. But do you think they’d get away clean and no one would have any idea what’s going on? It could happen but hasn’t yet.

It’s another day, why hasn’t some nut captured Back yet and done any of the fearful things you’re insinuating yet?

In fact why didn’t someone just kidnap and torture ALL of the possible Satoshis? The names have been known for quite some time. I’m sorry but your theory that revealing who Satoshi is, is bad doesn’t hold water.

So if someone broke into your house, murdered you, and stole all your money, you would die peacefully, knowing that the thief will be prosecuted?

What? They murdered me then stole my money. I’m dead before I knew I was robbed so in your scenario I can’t die knowing the thief would be prosecuted, because I’m already dead. I literally dont care what happens then because I have no agency at that point in time.

That's my point

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