Missing Internet Pioneer Phil Agre found alive (NPR)

NPR posted a folo:

UPDATE, 1/31, 6:55pm: I received an email from one of the people who has actively been involved in the search for Phil, and she isn't satisfied with the information released by the police. "For several reasons we cannot provide details, but what we can tell you is that the police did talk with Phil for a few minutes," she said. "Police standards for removing a missing persons notice is quite minimal. Those of us guiding the search for Phil have more detailed information about the interaction between the officer and Phil that is not being made public. The information we did receive gave us no evidence that he is actually "safe". Therefore we are continuing to search for him."

So... the situation may remain a bit more confused than initially seemed indicated.

And as for the "should we really be looking for him" issue, the American social contract tends to say, roughly, that if you're an active part of a community, and you drop off the face of the earth *with no notice*, people should worry, and look into it.

All that's necessary to tip the presumption in the other direction is "I'm going off the grid for a while; hope to be back." You're not required to say why or where, but if you don't say "that", then yes, people are going to worry and look into it... if you're lucky.

Sometimes people decide to disappear. The Police (and indeed many Missing Persons charities) are content if they discover that they have left of their own volition, there's no reason to intervene. Often family and friends, and even mere acquaintances find this hard to understand, but it's really not their right to have another person account for such a decision let alone to argue with them about it.

I am reminded of this: (from Greg Egan's Diaspora)

"That was the price of autonomy: an inalienable right to madness and suffering, inseparable from the right to solitude and peace."