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The Unix Philosophy

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Re: The Unix Philosophy

#21
post #11
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of interest, what are these political views that are so terrible that they should influence our views of his thoughts on operating system design? Edit: I really don't have any idea what they are...

Among other unpopular opinions, ESR denies AGW, believes that race and IQ are correlated, and was strongly in favor of the Iraq war.

Is that really it?

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#23
post #13

This should be taught in any programming class. > Rule of Diversity: Distrust all claims for “one true way”. Although, does the python rule "There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it." contradict this one ? > Rule 5. Data dominates. If you've chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are ce…

Perl is arguable much closer to the Unix philosophy than Python, for better or worse. That said, the "One obvious way" in Python is not exactly the same as "Only one true way".

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#24
post #11
post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Out of interest, what are these political views that are so terrible that they should influence our views of his thoughts on operating system design? Edit: I really don't have any idea what they are...

Among other unpopular opinions, ESR denies AGW, believes that race and IQ are correlated, and was strongly in favor of the Iraq war.

None of these seem even remotely relevant to engineering. Moreover, research, discovery and innovation requires letting people having freedom to think. That includes holding unpopular, controversial or politically incorrect opinions.

We are so worried about Evil Government dictating what we can and cannot think that we haven't noticed the current organic trend to prosecute every other person for thoughtcrimes. It's not the jackboot that keeps us on the ground, it's social media, and the public outrage you get when you disagree with whatever's the most popular opinion on a topic this week.

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#25
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Among other unpopular opinions, ESR denies AGW, believes that race and IQ are correlated, and was strongly in favor of the Iraq war.

Is that really it?

It's unclear whether you're suggesting his views are not sufficiently objectionable, or you're suggesting he has other views that are very objectionable that weren't enumerated above.

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#26
post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those seem only tenuously linked to me. Research ethics forbids you from doing certain things when performing research, but it doesn't say anything about the political opinions of researchers. The exclusionary rule says that if evidence is obtained by breaking the rules, it can't be used in court. But again, it doesn't say anything about the political opinions of the person obtaining the evidence.

Both are cases where the truth of the situation is put aside from a moral standpoint, which is analogous to suggesting that someone's political views could influence the reception of their engineering views.

Both exist mostly to disincentivize people from doing something immoral and/or unwanted, not to give light on the truth or false value of observations/evidence.

So the question is, should one really refuse to read/recommend ESR's book because of his opinions? Frankly, this smells to me like Index Librorum Prohibitorum all over again.

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#27
post #13

This should be taught in any programming class. > Rule of Diversity: Distrust all claims for “one true way”. Although, does the python rule "There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it." contradict this one ? > Rule 5. Data dominates. If you've chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are ce…

Rob Pike doesn't know Smalltalk, Self, or Common Lisp/CLOS--why should you care what his opinions are concerning OO as a paradigm?

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#28
post #13

This should be taught in any programming class. > Rule of Diversity: Distrust all claims for “one true way”. Although, does the python rule "There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it." contradict this one ? > Rule 5. Data dominates. If you've chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are ce…

> does the python rule "There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it." contradict this one ?

The irony is that Python has more ways of doing things in general and often the choice is very much non-obvious, compared to a language like Ruby which is supposedly embracing TIMTOWTDI. In other words, that Python rule doesn't match reality and I've always found it funny.

Re: The Unix Philosophy

#30
post #23
post #13

This should be taught in any programming class. > Rule of Diversity: Distrust all claims for “one true way”. Although, does the python rule "There should be one-- and preferably only one --obvious way to do it." contradict this one ? > Rule 5. Data dominates. If you've chosen the right data structures and organized things well, the algorithms will almost always be self-evident. Data structures, not algorithms, are ce…

Perl is arguable much closer to the Unix philosophy than Python, for better or worse. That said, the "One obvious way" in Python is not exactly the same as "Only one true way".

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