In a recent article in The New Republic, Lawrence Lessig cautions against openness in government.  He suggests that while some good may come from transparency, the “collateral consequence of that good need not itself be good.”

While I agree with his main conclusion, that campaign finance reform is essential to squelching the cynicism inherent in our current political system, I found many of his other conclusions along the way to be far less compelling.

For example, he points to the difficulties in mapping a causal connection between a particular campaign contribution and a particular vote cast. Of course, finding such a specific connection may not be possible. But he then builds on this idea by asking, “If the data does not tell us anything, what is the harm in producing it?”

But this starts with a non sequitur. While access to data may not tell us one specific thing (e.g., the connection between a particular contribution and a particular vote), that does not mean that it does not tell us anything. The data can tell us many things. Sure, there are people that will misinterpret the data, but this is nothing new. People routinely, systematically, and sometimes, willfully, misinterpret data every minute of every day (e.g., antivaxxers, young-earth creationists, holocaust deniers, homeopaths, and on and on). Suggesting that transparency-enabling data should be suppressed because people might draw erroneous conclusions (whether due to short attention spans, lack of foundational understanding, or whatever) is like suggesting that we should not explore the human genome, the stars, or the fossil record because people might draw erroneous conclusions. (Which, of course, some people do suggest, but we mostly think of that as crank fundamentalism.)

Transparency in government is a good thing and I am encouraged by the steps being taken to provide open access to government data, even if that means we still have to figure out the best ways to use that data.