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The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

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Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#111

Post by rjbwork »

sametmax wrote: post #76
blinkingled wrote: post #16

For some people conscious existence is too burdensome, uncomfortable, full of anxiety, outright maddening or some combination thereof. You see this in everyday life too, albeit in benign quantities - watch a kid after you tell him he can do nothing for the next hour. I had read Phil Katz's story before and I read it again today - it wasn't any less painful the second time around. I think if we were to debug it - ther…

+1. It took meditation to make me realize how much we suffer and react to it without realizing it a such a regular basis. It is so part of the everyday life, and anybody does so: children, adults, old people, rich, poor, healthy, sick, etc. We manage to feel that "conscious existence is too burdensome, uncomfortable, full of anxiety, outright maddening or some combination thereof" in any context, which is a hint that…

I don't think it inherent to the species, just to the way we've organized society. Only the privileged few among us truly get to self-actualize - to become our true selves and leave our marks upon the world before fading into oblivion a scant 8 decades after our arrival.

It is no wonder then that so many find a life of ultimately meaningless toil and distraction so dreadful, and akin to those words by OP.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#112

Post by labrador »

Mtinie wrote: post #57
labrador wrote: post #41

I'm not knocking anyone that talks about emotional pain as a reason to drink, but I want to offer an alternative theory alcoholism based on my experience. Many if not most people have settled on the theory of escape from a painful existence as an explanation, including many alcoholics. I've been battling alcohol since I was a teenager and now I'm almost 60. I've been in and out of rehab, lots of therapy and psychiatr…

You aren't alone. Should you ever want to chat/commiserate/pair program, you can contact me through my HN account. I don't have it all, though I have a lot, but I still find myself continuously drawn to a side that defies my own logic. I both glad and saddened to hear that I'm not alone.

Thanks. You are not alone. I meet people like me in AA and get coffee with them. I don't go now because I don't believe the program as designed actually works, at least for me. I also wasn't making connections at my favorite meeting. I may try another.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#113

Post by labrador »

jnbiche wrote: post #84
coldtea wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This goes against Occam's razor, needing 2 different mechanisms, one for people that manage to quit drinking (even after 5 decades of alcoholism) and one (genetic) for others that died alcoholics.

Well, specialists have long hypothesized that there is a huge difference between "heavy drinkers" (usually in their teens/20s and who quit) and "alcoholics". Heavy drinkers usually overimbibe as part of their social circle (fraternities, etc.) whereas budding alcoholics are the ones drinking alone at home in their teens/20s.

There is definitely a certain class of heavy drinker that isn't a real alcoholic. Some people just like the effect, but get tired of it.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#114

Post by labrador »

JamesBarney wrote: post #109
labrador wrote: post #41

I'm not knocking anyone that talks about emotional pain as a reason to drink, but I want to offer an alternative theory alcoholism based on my experience. Many if not most people have settled on the theory of escape from a painful existence as an explanation, including many alcoholics. I've been battling alcohol since I was a teenager and now I'm almost 60. I've been in and out of rehab, lots of therapy and psychiatr…

One way it hijacks the mind is through opiate receptors. I've heard good things about the Sinclair method(taking an opiate-blocker before having a drink), and it operates by blocking a lot of the euphoric aspects of alcohol. And slowly it causes the hooks that alcohol has sunk into the brain to whither and die. Or at least that's the theory.

I tried it but it didn't do much. I've actually found Kratom, which also works on those receptors, to be a good alternative. You can't overdose on Kratom and when I use it I don't ever get the urge to drink.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#115

Post by labrador »

coldtea wrote: post #75
echlebek wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If said friend wasn't genetically predisposed to alcoholism, it would explain why they would be able to quit drinking to excess with relative ease.

This goes against Occam's razor, needing 2 different mechanisms, one for people that manage to quit drinking (even after 5 decades of alcoholism) and one (genetic) for others that died alcoholics.

One reason I don't go to AA is that these days it is full of people who aren't real alcoholics. I can tell by listening to their stories. I imagine the same dichotomy for depressives. There's people who get really sad and filled with grief, usually about some event, and then there's real depressives who get devastated and blanked out for no apparent reason. They don't feel anything.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#116

Post by groovy2shoes »

labrador wrote: post #114
JamesBarney wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One way it hijacks the mind is through opiate receptors. I've heard good things about the Sinclair method(taking an opiate-blocker before having a drink), and it operates by blocking a lot of the euphoric aspects of alcohol. And slowly it causes the hooks that alcohol has sunk into the brain to whither and die. Or at least that's the theory.

I tried it but it didn't do much. I've actually found Kratom, which also works on those receptors, to be a good alternative. You can't overdose on Kratom and when I use it I don't ever get the urge to drink.

So many benefits to that plant, and yet the various state governments have been in a hurry to criminalize it. What a shame that so many people who had been struggling with addiction and finally found an affordable, legal, and ostensibly safe relief in kratom, only to have it taken away without legislators giving it any real consideration.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#117

Post by bluedino »

WalterBright wrote: post #62
smarks wrote: post #46

Very sad story. The guy's initials are immortalized in the magic number of the zip file format, the bytes of which are 0x50 0x4b 0x03 0x04 The values 0x50 0x4b are 'P' 'K' in ASCII. Note also that every Java JAR file is also a ZIP file, so they all begin with the same magic number.

Windows executables start with "MZ", for Mark Zbikowski. Edit: fixed the name

As a kid poking around with the built-in DOSSHELL hex viewer, I thought it was slang for MS/Microsoft

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#118

Post by bluedino »

duskwuff wrote: post #35
dispose13432 wrote: post #29

Off topic, but what was so special about the "zip" file over a ".tar.Z" file, especially that it already existed when ZIP came out?

- It had a table of contents. You can list the contents of a ZIP file, or even extract individual files, without having to decompress the whole thing. (Which was a particularly big deal back in the 90s, when extracting a large archive would take a while.) - You could update an archive in place. Not incredibly useful, but certainly nifty. - It had support for multi-disk archives. Again, big deal in the 90s. Finally, l…

And even if you had a UNIX tar.z file, chances are the data would be in big endian, have UNIX line endings, and you'd have to do all kinds of wizardry to use the file on a PC running DOS/Windows

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#119

Post by bitexploder »

rjbwork wrote: post #111
sametmax wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1. It took meditation to make me realize how much we suffer and react to it without realizing it a such a regular basis. It is so part of the everyday life, and anybody does so: children, adults, old people, rich, poor, healthy, sick, etc. We manage to feel that "conscious existence is too burdensome, uncomfortable, full of anxiety, outright maddening or some combination thereof" in any context, which is a hint that…

I don't think it inherent to the species, just to the way we've organized society. Only the privileged few among us truly get to self-actualize - to become our true selves and leave our marks upon the world before fading into oblivion a scant 8 decades after our arrival. It is no wonder then that so many find a life of ultimately meaningless toil and distraction so dreadful, and akin to those words by OP.

I think it a great delusion to asscoiate self-actualization with privelege and leaving a mark on the world. It is the grandiose fiction playing out in the minds of many to design that a true self must leave a mark upon "the world". What a dependency. Truth is our brains are complex little machines composed of smaller machines cooperating and at times fighting for the primacy of resources. We exist. Creators create. Let that be enough. Judgment and opinion of our creation is largely beyond us. A person of no privilege can know his existence the same as one of great privilege. The mind is always obscuring reality with its machinery, noisy with the remnants of evolution. See past it friend.

Re: The short, tormented life of computer genius Phil Katz (2000)

#120

Post by [deleted] »

rjbwork wrote: post #111
sametmax wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

+1. It took meditation to make me realize how much we suffer and react to it without realizing it a such a regular basis. It is so part of the everyday life, and anybody does so: children, adults, old people, rich, poor, healthy, sick, etc. We manage to feel that "conscious existence is too burdensome, uncomfortable, full of anxiety, outright maddening or some combination thereof" in any context, which is a hint that…

I don't think it inherent to the species, just to the way we've organized society. Only the privileged few among us truly get to self-actualize - to become our true selves and leave our marks upon the world before fading into oblivion a scant 8 decades after our arrival. It is no wonder then that so many find a life of ultimately meaningless toil and distraction so dreadful, and akin to those words by OP.

[deleted]
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