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Sabbath mode
11–20 of 175 posts
Re: Sabbath mode
#12Clever hack, but if you're coming up with ways to circumvent your religion's practices, are you really still practicing your religion?
I'm not religious, much less Jewish, but I'd say it depends on the intention behind the practice. If it was intended to encourage the abnegation of luxuries, I think the hacks would miss the point, but since the intention seems to be, as I understand it, to remember and celebrate the Biblical creation, I think it could be argued that the hacks actually help to reinforce that.
(Like I said, this is my interpretation and opinion as someone from outside. I make no claim to know or understand Jewish law and traditions.)
Re: Sabbath mode
#13Possibly related: http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/21/us/brooklyn-fire-children-kill... TL;DR: Tragic fire caused by a hot plate left on overnight so that it could be used to warm food on the Sabbath.
My mom just told me about that story, and when I came to HN I thought it had to be related that this made front page on HN exactly when this tragedy happened.
Re: Sabbath mode
#14Clever hack, but if you're coming up with ways to circumvent your religion's practices, are you really still practicing your religion?
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Re: Sabbath mode
#15Clever hack, but if you're coming up with ways to circumvent your religion's practices, are you really still practicing your religion?
Welcome to the world of Jewish law, in which it's considered acceptable to find ways around rules.
For example: Jews aren't allowed to eat leavened food, known as "chamets," (e.g., bread) on Passover. We're also not allowed to own leavened products. What do you do with all of the food that you bought before Passover? In theory, you have to throw it out, which would be a huge waste of money.
The solution is to sell this food to a non-Jew for the duration of the holiday. The contract says that the non-Jew owns these products for seven days (or eight, if you're outside of Israel). At the conclusion of the holiday, the non-Jew sells it back to the Jew, or fails to finalize the sale, or fails to exercise his/her option, etc.
Problem solved: Jews don't own chametz. We don't have to throw it out.
Is this using a legal loophole? Oh, yes. Is it universally accepted? No, but pretty close to 100% of the religious Jews I know do it. Have there been big arguments over this subject over the years? Of course! It's Jewish religious law, in which arguments are a part of the culture...
Re: Sabbath mode
#16Clever hack, but if you're coming up with ways to circumvent your religion's practices, are you really still practicing your religion?
Disclaimer: I'm Jewish and religious, but not Orthodox; I don't worry about sabbath mode as I have no problem turning on an oven during shabbat; it's not work. That said, if you ask Orthodox Jews, they will say it's not circumventing the laws about shabbat. Rather, it's keeping the laws of shabbat -- avoiding all forms of work -- while still living in the modern world. To circumvent the law would be to find a way tha…
To extend on parent comment: What you call "circumvent your religion's practices", ie building complicated logical arguments or creating new categories and distinctions to re-interpret existing law is considered as a significant part of Jewish religion:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talmud#Pilpul
In that aspect, Judaism is very different from, say, Christianity.
Re: Sabbath mode
#17Clever hack, but if you're coming up with ways to circumvent your religion's practices, are you really still practicing your religion?
I'm a non-observant Jew and have several observant friends. I always joke with them that Jews are the first hackers, finding ways to circumvent their own religious laws.
Some other clever hacks "exploited" by Jews over the years:
* Say a door needs to be opened by a button. For some reason which I can't quite remember right now, you can't just press the button to open the door, but say that after you press the button there is a random wait befroe the door is opened, then it's OK.
* You can't light fire on shabbat and, by some logic, that also means you can't close an electrical circuit. But say you have a door that requires a keycard to open. You can't put the keycard next to the reader because that will cause a circuit to close but if you were to press a button that turns off the card reader for some random amount of time (which is OK) and then just happen to put your card in range, when the reader turns itself back on it will recognize your card and open the door.
* You can't create permanent things on shabbat and that includes writing. But, say you have to write for some reason - you use a shbbat pan with ink that evaporates after several days (hence, is non-permanent).
There are lots of theese hacks, and even a whole R&D center dedicated to them[1] in Israel. Funny stuff.
[1] http://www.zomet.org.il/ (Hebrew)
Re: Sabbath mode
#18Your body regenerates new cells all the time; that is creative work (certainly, if closing a switch counts as such). I think what you need is a Sabbath cryogenic chamber, so that you don't commit such transgressions as growing stubble.
Re: Sabbath mode
#19Re: Sabbath mode
#20The problem with posting this on a Saturday is that any readers of hacker news that use these devices will be unable to comment.
As long as at least the downvote button is considered work, I'm happy. :)