• Transporter Room 3@startrek.website
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      1 year ago

      I can’t think of a single reason knowledge should be forbidden.

      Sure, someone could use knowledge to do bad things, but that is true literally every second of every day, in completely above board, legal, broad daylight bad things.

      It’s nitpicking.

      Besides, I can think of quite a few legitimate reasons one might need napalm, explosives, homemade firearms, chemistry lab setups and spore cultures and much much more.

      A lot of people seem to forget that their own view of their own government doesn’t mean the same things are true for someone else and their government.

      I’m sure a lot of people in EU countries might have asked themselves the same thing 80 years ago. You know… If napalm were around then anyway.

      Good thing molotovs are easy and can be assembly-line’d.

      • Cethin@lemmy.zip
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        1 year ago

        A lot of people seem to forget that their own view of their own government doesn’t mean the same things are true for someone else and their government.

        It also doesn’t mean it’ll be true for their own government in the future. Violence sucks, but it isn’t always bad. People should be allowed to learn these thing just for the fun of it if they want. Hopefully the time never comes where they need to be practically applied (besides the situations you gave and others like them) but if it does the knowledge will hopefully be available.

    • FringeTheory999@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      Writing a book or screen play, knowing how NOT to create napalm, recognizing when napalm is being created by others, Intellectual curiosity, To better understand military history, overthrowing fascism, fighting terminators, etc. etc.

    • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
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      1 year ago

      I’m sure there are some, but it doesn’t really matter because the recipe is publicly available right now on the internet. So if an AI chatbot can give you the information it’s not particularly a concern.

      It’s not actually hard to make.

      • GONADS125@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        My brother made some years ago when I was a kid. It melted asphalt into a wavy, glassy texture.

    • CurlyMoustache@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      How to make sure I’m not making it by accident? That is the reason why I have a general understanding of atomic bombs

    • KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      1 year ago

      What possible legitimate reason could someone need to know how to make chlorine/mustard gas?

      Apart from the fact that they are made from common household products, are easy to make by mistake, and can kill you.

      Wait that’s true of napalm as well… fuck.

      • MonkderZweite@feddit.ch
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        1 year ago

        Uh, wait, the jelly i once made in my dads workshop by dissolving styrofoam in gasoline, was already a napalm substitute?

        • Transporter Room 3@startrek.website
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          1 year ago

          So I have no other reason for sharing this than “napalm substitute” and I never get to talk about it.

          My dad and his brothers dumped a bunch of packing peanuts into gasoline to make the soup, got a bunch of tennis balls, and DROVE A CAR (junker, but still) onto a frozen lake, with lighters and candles, a small bucket of gasoline and a bucket of water.

          The plan was for one of them to drive around sliding all over the ice while the others dunked a ball into the soup, light it, and throw it at the car.

          Now you might wonder why they did the napalm substitute.

          Because THEY ALREADY FUCKING TRIED THIS with regular gasoline, and quickly found out gasoline soaked tennis balls splash when thrown. Specifically onto their backs. While burning. I’ve seen burn scars on at least two of his brothers from the shit they did as teenagers.

          So the napalm was a bit more grippy to the balls. But still not enough.

          Apparently they never figured out how to “safely” do it, but boy that sure didn’t stop them from doing this several years in a row.

          I saw his lake frozen over ONCE when I was a child. Nowadays it barely gets ice around the shoreline.

          I don’t think they ever had a plan for if the car actually caught on fire, my guess is “let it burn into the ice, sink, and forget about it”