so this is basically a simplified version of the null object pattern with all its problems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_Object_pattern http://en.wikipedi

so this is basically a simplified version of the null object pattern with all its problems. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_Object_pattern http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Null_Object_pattern it is worse than the null object pattern though as you have done it to your entire application. a better approach would be to determine when you have a hash that you want this behaviour from and implement a class for that specific behaviour rather than shotgunning it into everything.