Slashdot Mirror

TYPE MISMATCH: legs is of type LIMB, blocked is of type BOOLEAN
FATAL ERROR: stop walking is not a known function

Peer-to-peer computing is so new that no one is even attempting to define it. P2P could be servers talking to servers, servers talking to PCs, PCs talking to PCs, or WAP phones talking to all of them.

Oh yes, peer to peer computing is so new that you can't define it. We've never seen a peer to peer based system before. Nope, never. Who would do a thing like that?

All snideness aside, we all know that peers are equal -- This is the most important piece of information to understand a peer-to-peer system. Whether it is a social system in which everyone is potentially equal, but various peers decide who will listen harder to who, thereby defining the balance of power, or a networking protocol in which the same thing happens, the concept of a peer is the same. We see it in video games, in packet radio systems, and in our social lives.

No central server? Is every client a server, and every server a client? Is there no central control? Must be peer to peer. (If it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck...)

Go read your Jargon file

A Portrait of J. Random Hacker - Politics

• Developers work on what they want to work on. You can't reassign them as though doing OSS development is their job or something.
• Parallel development is a good thing. The way Open Source development coordinates tens of thousands of developers (or however many) is by saying "go do what interests you", and .. well, no two people write the exact same programme. If it's all open source eventually the best ideas get integrated.
  
  In fact, I would say that open source development is a good example of mimetic evolution. Multiple programmes sharing the same niche allows more vectors for improvement. The more journaling filesystems that bring ideas to US the better off we are! (given that we're working with a modular kernal that can support multiple filesystems formats easily).
  

Sorry, the idea's been taken, though not patented. See The Jargon File's entry on "write-only memory".

Actually the n*zis weren't mentioned. you lose because by mentioning godwin's law you invoke a new law which i now name after myself (bobby shandleson) which states "In any thread with less than 20 responses, a person who invokes godwin's law is a person with too much time on their hands."

godwin's law

Sadly, some folk, including the moderator who flamebaited and Styopa read the first couple lines and judged the piece, out of context.

My original, though perhaps to tangential, purpose and execution was to draw attention to Godwin's Law, which I leave to the reader to follow the link. Katz somehow saw fit to exclude this useful watermark, let alone how the individual should employ it with all objectivity.


--
Chief Frog Inspector

I hope this does not give all of you GwG folks the wrong impression. The environment is beautiful. We should strive to protect it. Do not go shooting down bald eagles because you think they can be grown back by science. Giving a scientist employment is not a rational justification for taking life.

By your definition, I have the right to paint swastikas on the wall and doors of the local synagogue (yes, I know, we're pushing Godwin's Law here. . .). But I'm quite sure that if I did it, I'd be prosecuted, and rightly so. Why ??? Trespass is not, as you would say, "coercively harmful", and as for the swastikas, hey, that's just freedom of expression. Or to use a more classic example, the right to free speech does NOT extend to the right to shout "fire" in a crowded venue. . .

Rights ***DO*** have to be laid out and delineated as to how far they go. . .

One of the side-effects of that merger is that AMD and Intel have a very comprehensive patent cross-licensing deal, which was "inherited" from National Semiconductor. This is why Intel has not attempted to sue AMD for patent infringement since the days of the K5 cpu. It's also the reason that Intel forced the "Slot 1" bus architecture down the throats of most of the mobo companies a few years back: it was "new" and thus not covered by the agreement. Unfortunatly, it also turned out to be both a political and an engineering mistake, leading to the current chilly relationship between Chipzilla and most of the taiwanese mobo companies... ~

One of the side-effects of that merger is that AMD and Intel have a very comprehensive patent cross-licensing deal, which was "inherited" from National Semiconductor. This is why Intel has not attempted to sue AMD for patent infringement since the days of the K5 cpu. It's also the reason that Intel forced the "Slot 1" bus architecture down the throats of most of the mobo companies a few years back: it was "new" and thus not covered by the agreement. Unfortunatly, it also turned out to be both a political and an engineering mistake, leading to the current chilly relationship between Chipzilla and most of the taiwanese mobo companies...

The trolls are at least intelligent enough to spell epiphany right, as opposed to you. Do you even know what this word means?

In addition I think you misunderstand what a troll really is.

Is this a troll?

No, but this is. (Mad props to him btw)

Rest assured that most quality trolls are actually long-standing members of the slashdot readership and know very well how this place works. If it weren't for trolls, this place would long ago have degenerated into a meeting place for drooling linux-r00lz-m$-sucks-gimme-warez wankers.

Face it, we keep this place alive. You need us.

...Uh, IHBT, right?

PUC - Public Utilities Commission
TCPA - Telephone Consumer Protecton Act
LART - Luser Attitude Readjustment Tool


Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.

Before you spout too much about kernel configuration, I'd suggest grabbing ESR's CML2 configuration system. This has all you want and more, the only possible problem being its reliance on Python (last I checked). It's very well thought-out and deserves acceptence into the kernel sometime soon.

I have used Reiser in the past, but some big fs corruption due in part to a badly-applied Reiser patch (I think...) forced me to reinstall, and I haven't gotten Reiser back in yet. Unfortunately my partition table is full at the moment (everything primary -- dang x86 partition table), so I can't even resize something to make room for a temporary backup partition. Anybody know how to make a primary partition become a logical partition, especially if resize is a possibility?

After all these years, BIND still hasn't fulfilled the vision of open-source, first spoken by Eric Stallman Raymond, and later realized by Linux Torvalds.

Definition of Open Source given in ESR's Jargon File.

Download Bind 8 Sources

Finally, the contents of the LICENSE file in the current BIND distribution:

## Copyright (c) 1993-2000 by Internet Software Consortium, Inc.
##
## Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any
## purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
## copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.
##
## THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND INTERNET SOFTWARE CONSORTIUM DISCLAIMS
## ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES
## OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL INTERNET SOFTWARE
## CONSORTIUM BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
## DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR
## PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS
## ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS
## SOFTWARE.

I didn't bother to C&P their address, which I'm sure is somewhere on their webpage.

How do the definition and the current BIND license (which I think we can expect to carry over to BIND9) not jibe? In fact, it's not just Open Source, it's Free Software as defined by RMS.

After all these years, BIND still hasn't fulfilled the vision of open-source, first spoken by Eric Stallman Raymond, and later realized by Linux Torvalds.

Definition of Open Source given in ESR's Jargon File.

Download Bind 8 Sources

Finally, the contents of the LICENSE file in the current BIND distribution:

## Copyright (c) 1993-2000 by Internet Software Consortium, Inc.
##
## Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any
## purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
## copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.
##
## THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND INTERNET SOFTWARE CONSORTIUM DISCLAIMS
## ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES
## OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL INTERNET SOFTWARE
## CONSORTIUM BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
## DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR
## PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS
## ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS
## SOFTWARE.

I didn't bother to C&P their address, which I'm sure is somewhere on their webpage.

How do the definition and the current BIND license (which I think we can expect to carry over to BIND9) not jibe? In fact, it's not just Open Source, it's Free Software as defined by RMS.

After all these years, BIND still hasn't fulfilled the vision of open-source, first spoken by Eric Stallman Raymond, and later realized by Linux Torvalds.

Definition of Open Source given in ESR's Jargon File.

Download Bind 8 Sources

Finally, the contents of the LICENSE file in the current BIND distribution:

## Copyright (c) 1993-2000 by Internet Software Consortium, Inc.
##
## Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any
## purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
## copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.
##
## THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND INTERNET SOFTWARE CONSORTIUM DISCLAIMS
## ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES
## OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL INTERNET SOFTWARE
## CONSORTIUM BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
## DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR
## PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS
## ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS
## SOFTWARE.

I didn't bother to C&P their address, which I'm sure is somewhere on their webpage.

How do the definition and the current BIND license (which I think we can expect to carry over to BIND9) not jibe? In fact, it's not just Open Source, it's Free Software as defined by RMS.

After all these years, BIND still hasn't fulfilled the vision of open-source, first spoken by Eric Stallman Raymond, and later realized by Linux Torvalds.

Definition of Open Source given in ESR's Jargon File.

Download Bind 8 Sources

Finally, the contents of the LICENSE file in the current BIND distribution:

## Copyright (c) 1993-2000 by Internet Software Consortium, Inc.
##
## Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any
## purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above
## copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.
##
## THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND INTERNET SOFTWARE CONSORTIUM DISCLAIMS
## ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES
## OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL INTERNET SOFTWARE
## CONSORTIUM BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
## DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR
## PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS
## ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS
## SOFTWARE.

I didn't bother to C&P their address, which I'm sure is somewhere on their webpage.

How do the definition and the current BIND license (which I think we can expect to carry over to BIND9) not jibe? In fact, it's not just Open Source, it's Free Software as defined by RMS.

Or as we old-farts like to call it: The September That Never Ended.

It's just that it took a couple of years for September to catch up with alt.2600.

Lubarsky's Law of Cybernetic Entomology, in the Jargon File. Of Course were supposed to find and fix bugs, but this is more a 'rate' thing. Its not like anyone designed linux and everything we ship in a distro from the ground up, this software evolved, and is still evolving.

-- Crutcher --
#include <disclaimer.h>

This will probably get me flamed, but... It seems to me that RedHat's approach to releases is more inline with the successful model of opensource software.

If you read, The Cathedral and the Bazaar, by Eric Raymond, he suggests that the strategy to "Release Early, Release Often" was a critical part of Linux development. It got the new source out into the public, where feisty members of the OS community tore into it, found bugs, sent 'em in, and all-in-all got a better software going. It makes sense - the enthusiasts got to tackle it more often, and felt like they were participating in a positive effort towards something they all wanted. He even proved it worked that way in his work with fetchmail.

This isn't to say that it isn't a pain in the ass for those of us who are new to Linux, but frankly, as has been said, if you want the stable version, you just download an earlier version. I think that the ability to do that the middle ground. :) As I understand it, and admittedly...I am new to this, part of the fun in Linux is finding the bugs and getting them fixed. :)

~S

We read about this, didn't we kids?

"1. Every good work of software starts by scratching a developer's personal itch." Far fetched? Hear me out.

Slashdot, Vanguard (according to Katz, anyway) of the Geek Culture, is a victim of it's own success. I started here not long after Linux hit the mainstream, just as I got curious about the "new OS in town". Seemed like a nice spot. I think a search engine link brought me here. My first post was some drivel about how Linux zealots were being hipocrytes - they wanted users, but only the smart ones, and that wasn't how to complete the "World Domination" they craved. My little diatribe seemed well recieved, and caused a good discussion to happen - so I created my account and have stuck around. (Actually, IIRC, my response was to a someone slagging Kats when he was trying to install Linux on his laptop - and Taco helped him with it. Ironic, eh?) It seems I've watched /. go downhill ever since. Why? Simple - the human need for acceptance. This, faithful Slashdot Readers, Friends, Moderators, Karma Whores and Trolls, is the itch that /. scratches.

The one thing that always strikes one full in the face about the "geek culture" is that it's real currency is Intellect, and the display thereof. CmdrTaco, in his infinite wisdom, put a real, monetary value to the intellegence displayed by we people who post - Karma points - instead of measuring them by the quality of the thread created. Now, intead of soliciting replies in order to get lively debate, discussion and possibly New Clues, we solicit Karma. Karma, so we don't look like idiots to our peers. Or, if we figure that we don't rate, and haven't got the chance to, we troll or pop in as an AC - to hopefully deflect some of the moderators away from putting other people's "Inellect" ahead of our own. Signal 11 is right - it's now a contest to see who can win the title of "Most Intellegent Geek", not "News for Nerds. Stuff that Matters" - we all seem to want scratch our itch to be viewed as "Intelligent" to our peers.

No Slashdot account with a cool nic? You're just not in the game anymore, man. Don't run Linux? Further damage to your credibility. Only 3 Karma points? HAHAHHAH, you're either a moron or a Micr$oft shill, dude!

Personally, it's getting to the point that I don't give a flying fuck about my Karma anymore. +1 Bonus? Who cares. It'll just be drowned out in the rush to be first with some sort of incredibly pendantic navel gazing that we've all heard before. "Preaching to the Chior" indeed.

At least I don't have to sort through C/Net, ZDNet,Kiro5hin or the BBC to get to the importatnt stuff anymore - just the repeat stories here. VA - you've been HAD.

"Thank you for your post. That'll be 5.95 in Karma, buddy"

If any of you are confused about what a hacker is and is not, especially in terms of how we relate to crackers, take a gander at Eric S. Raymond's info about hackers at his web page.

For those of you who don't have time to do this, I've included a small portion of the page below:

"What Is A Hacker?

The Jargon File contains a bunch of definitions of the term `hacker', most having to do with technical adeptness and a delight in solving problems and overcoming limits. If you want to know how to become a hacker, though, only two are really relevant.

There is a community, a shared culture, of expert programmers and networking wizards that traces its history back through decades to the first time-sharing minicomputers and the earliest ARPAnet experiments. The members of this culture originated the term `hacker'. Hackers built the Internet. Hackers made the Unix operating system what it is today. Hackers run Usenet. Hackers make the World Wide Web work. If you are part of this culture, if you have contributed to it and other people in it know who you are and call you a hacker, you're a hacker.

The hacker mind-set is not confined to this software-hacker culture. There are people who apply the hacker attitude to other things, like electronics or music -- actually, you can find it at the highest levels of any science or art. Software hackers recognize these kindred spirits elsewhere and may call them "hackers" too -- and some claim that the hacker nature is really independent of the particular medium the hacker works in. But in the rest of this document we will focus on the skills and attitudes of software hackers, and the traditions of the shared culture that originated the term `hacker'.

There is another group of people who loudly call themselves hackers, but aren't. These are people (mainly adolescent males) who get a kick out of breaking into computers and phreaking the phone system. Real hackers call these people `crackers' and want nothing to do with them. Real hackers mostly think crackers are lazy, irresponsible, and not very bright, and object that being able to break security doesn't make you a hacker any more than being able to hotwire cars makes you an automotive engineer. Unfortunately, many journalists and writers have been fooled into using the word `hacker' to describe crackers; this irritates real hackers no end.

The basic difference is this: hackers build things, crackers break them.

If you want to be a hacker, keep reading. If you want to be a cracker, go read the alt.2600 newsgroup and get ready to do five to ten in the slammer after finding out you aren't as smart as you think you are. And that's all I'm going to say about crackers."

Crackers are the lowest form of scum. Someone who would derive pleasure from causing others pain, which is what crackers do when they write viri and engage in DOS attacks etc., should simply be taken out into the woods and after being made to dig their own grave shot in the back of the head.

TO HELL WITH KEVIN

Lee Reynolds

This sounds like a case ofGodwin's Law

This argument persists because people seem to have a hard time accepting the fact that words mean things. When they don't accept the real definition of a word they attempt to coopt it for their own purposes.

Josh Centers started the Hacker Anti-Defamation League a couple of years ago to try to counteract the media's mis-use of Hacker, but the project has never really taken off.

Remember that just because a bunch of people believe something doesn't make it true.

This argument persists because people seem to have a hard time accepting the fact that words mean things. When they don't accept the real definition of a word they attempt to coopt it for their own purposes.

Josh Centers started the Hacker Anti-Defamation League a couple of years ago to try to counteract the media's mis-use of Hacker, but the project has never really taken off.

Remember that just because a bunch of people believe something doesn't make it true.

--

Mind you, when you're designing an accessible RAD macro-language, you don't want C, you do want something simpler. The Jargon File entry for Pascal, which spells out it's unsuitability as a general purpose language, IMO also shows why it would be a good choice for this. Delphi's ObjectPascal is a case in point.

A programming language, originally designed for Dartmouth's experimental timesharing system in the early 1960s, which for many years was the leading cause of brain damage in proto-hackers. Edsger W. Dijkstra observed in "Selected Writings on Computing: A Personal Perspective" that "It is practically impossible to teach good programming style to students that have had prior exposure to BASIC: as potential programmers they are mentally mutilated beyond hope of regeneration." This is another case (like Pascal) of the cascading lossage that happens when a language deliberately designed as an educational toy gets taken too seriously. A novice can write short BASIC programs (on the order of 10-20 lines) very easily; writing anything longer (a) is very painful, and (b) encourages bad habits that will make it harder to use more powerful languages well. This wouldn't be so bad if historical accidents hadn't made BASIC so common on low-end micros in the 1980s. As it is, it probably ruined tens of thousands of potential wizards.

No, you idiots, you're not hackers, you're crackers. True hackers don't break into systems. Go read the Jargon File entry for "hacker" and the Jargon File entry for "cracker". Then read them again, and again, until you understand the difference.
--

No, you idiots, you're not hackers, you're crackers. True hackers don't break into systems. Go read the Jargon File entry for "hacker" and the Jargon File entry for "cracker". Then read them again, and again, until you understand the difference.
--

Even if you have the source, that isn't a 100% guarantee that there aren't any back doors. Surely everyone remembers the famous Ken Thompson article about the back door in login with support in the C compiler, which is even referenced in the Jargon File.

Jargon Lexicon entry: magic smoke

-- Sig (120 chars) --
Your friendly neighborhood mIRC scripter.

Jargon Lexicon entry: magic smoke

-- Sig (120 chars) --
Your friendly neighborhood mIRC scripter.

see Jargon definition of suit
...Invariably worn with a `tie', a strangulation device that partially cuts off the blood supply to the brain. It is thought that this explains much about the behavior of suit-wearers.
;)

well, maybe it's not that bad after all ! (depending on the money you'll make because after all, this is the main reason why you're to accept the job aren't you)

Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.

Here's a good explaination.
--

< CmdrTaco And Hemos Speaking At MIT Thurs | Mozilla-KDE Integration >

vapour
.
..

Um. No. ESR didn't "write" it...so go learn something.

It appears that ESR basically cribbed everything he could from Hacks to write his Hacker's Dictionary.

*sigh*.

ESR is only the current maintainer of the Hacker's Dictionary. It is the merging of two works: JARGON.TXT, which had been floating around the 'net for aeons being incrementally revised by various people, and "The Hacker's Dictionary", written in 1983 by Guy Steel.

This predates the publication of "Hackers".

See http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/jargtxt.html for some of this.

Trove is a next-generation Internet software archiving facility, intended to supplant the classical FTP-tree-with-decorations model.

There's even real code available, in Python, which I confess I haven't looked at, so I'm vauge on what it does or soesn't do yet. I suspect there's that which is worth a look.

Hackers needed to "hack" apart monitors and remove lead from old monitors to recycle lead parts.

Maybe by filling them with lead? :)

TLA /T-L-A/ n.

[Three-Letter Acronym] 1. Self-describing abbreviation for a species with which computing terminology is infested. 2. Any confusing acronym. Examples include MCA, FTP, SNA, CPU, MMU, SCCS, DMU, FPU, NNTP, TLA. People who like this looser usage argue that not all TLAs have three letters, just as not all four-letter words have four letters. One also hears of `ETLA' (Extended Three-Letter Acronym, pronounced /ee tee el ay/) being used to describe four-letter acronyms. The term `SFLA' (Stupid Four-Letter Acronym) has also been reported. See also YABA.

The self-effacing phrase "TDM TLA" (Too Damn Many...) is often used to bemoan the plethora of TLAs in use. In 1989, a random of the journalistic persuasion asked hacker Paul Boutin "What do you think will be the biggest problem in computing in the 90s?" Paul's straight-faced response: "There are only 17,000 three-letter acronyms." (To be exact, there are 26^3 = 17,576.) There is probably some karmic justice in the fact that Paul Boutin subsequently became a journalist.

TLA /T-L-A/ n.

[Three-Letter Acronym] 1. Self-describing abbreviation for a species with which computing terminology is infested. 2. Any confusing acronym. Examples include MCA, FTP, SNA, CPU, MMU, SCCS, DMU, FPU, NNTP, TLA. People who like this looser usage argue that not all TLAs have three letters, just as not all four-letter words have four letters. One also hears of `ETLA' (Extended Three-Letter Acronym, pronounced /ee tee el ay/) being used to describe four-letter acronyms. The term `SFLA' (Stupid Four-Letter Acronym) has also been reported. See also YABA.

The self-effacing phrase "TDM TLA" (Too Damn Many...) is often used to bemoan the plethora of TLAs in use. In 1989, a random of the journalistic persuasion asked hacker Paul Boutin "What do you think will be the biggest problem in computing in the 90s?" Paul's straight-faced response: "There are only 17,000 three-letter acronyms." (To be exact, there are 26^3 = 17,576.) There is probably some karmic justice in the fact that Paul Boutin subsequently became a journalist.

The open-source culture has an elaborate but largely unadmitted set of ownership customs. These customs regulate who can modify software, the circumstances under which it can be modified, and (especially) who has the right to redistribute modified versions back to the community.

Yet a third interesting feature is that as these customs have evolved over time, they have done so in a consistent direction. That direction has been to encourage more public accountability, more public notice, and more care about preserving the credits and change histories of projects in ways which (among other things) establish the legitimacy of the present owners.

Calling Open Source methods the Cathedral is simply ridiculous. The cathedral is monolithic and it's architecture can't be changed. Bazaars involve negotiation, haggling, keeping a sharp eye out for prevailing opinion, constantly changing power relationships. Which of those two describes the Open Source community we all know.

This is one of those "They're all wrong and I'm right" articles. Only he isn't.

...average beige boxen...

If you look up and to the left of your 'n' key, you'll find an 's' key. I hope it's not broken? Open your eyen and use the right lettern.

Or (thanks to ESR) you can try this.

Denying people anything on the premise that it could be used for harmful activities was the way Hitler conducted government.

D'oh! You were doing sooo well until you invoked Godwin's Law. Better luck next time.

----
Dave
MicrosoftME®? No, Microsoft YOU, buddy! - my boss

I believe in X, and I think I'm a pretty smart hacker type. I wonder if other hacker types believe in X too. Oh, look, here are a few really smart hacker types, and they believe in X, so I guess hackers in general must believe in X. I wonder why that is. Well, we're all hyper-smart rational types, so it must be that...

If you want to see some really good examples of this phenomenon in action, have a(nother) look at the Jargon File; it is rife with them. I mean, do we really believe that you're not a true hacker if you don't like Chinese food? I suspect not, but the guys that wrote the Jargon File liked it, and they constructed a whole mythology around why it was only natural that their hacker nature should lead to a love of Chinese food. It's the same thing with religion; in fact, with religion people have even more personal incentive to rationalize their beliefs, particularly in a subculture that prizes logic and analytical skills above all else.

My feeling is that there probably isn't any one religious stereotype that applies to hackers in general. There may be a slight trend away from mainstream religion, but even at that there seems to be no shortage of hackers that do follow a mainstream religion. Just believe what you want to believe, and don't worry about whether it's the "hackish" thing to do. And don't waste time trying to rationalize it. Religion is an inherently nonrational phenomenon, and that is not a bad thing.

-rpl

There is no God. There are no gods... There is no such thing as chi.

"Chi" literally just means "breath", which clearly exists; if you mean the semi-supernatural "life energy" extolled by some I'll agree that it doesn't have physical existence, yet concepts of chi can be useful in martial arts and in healing practices.

Atheism is not incompatable with Paganism. I label myself a Zen Pagan Taoist Atheist Discordian; it all fits together.

My point is, there is no reason to think that anything exists aside from what we can detect with our senses (and devices that enhance our senses, like radio telescopes).

Does the number 3 exist? Does truth? Beauty? The note Bb? The color red? The property redness? Your thoughts? Your mind? My mind?

Who is more real: Mr. Spock, or John Smith, Esq. of Crofton, Maryland? One is fictional, one is (according to the phonebook) a real person; but Mr. Spock exists in many more minds than Mr. Smith. Which is the more durable existence?

Every see Penn & Teller in action? Your senses are limited and can be fooled; what reason do you have to think that what you can detect with them means anything? What assumptions are you making when you integrate sense data? What other sets of assumptions are possible? Can these other sets of assumption led to useful results?

The Paganism I practice has more to do with questions like this than with "How do I cast a love spell?"

it's unlikely that there's much of a direct link between hacking and getting interested in mysticism, or being a mystic and getting interested in hacking.

You should come to a Pagan festival like Starwood or the Free Spirit Gathering and see just how many hackers are there. It's remarkable, and leaves little doubt that there is some connection.

IMHO, Zen and Paganism appeal to hackers because they are centered on experience, rather than dogma ("Beware of bugs in the above code; I have only proven it correct, not tested it"), and because they allow for heterodoxy ("There's more than one way to do it.").

Suggested reading: my own introduction to the Laughing Thunder Circle and ESR's Frequently Asked Questions about Neopaganism