4 ms·
What I am not sure is that the word 'hacker' is a useful word. There were other words widely used before the word hacker appeared: 'smart people', 'creative peo
by nadam 16y ago
What I am not sure is that the word 'hacker' is a useful word. There were other words widely used before the word hacker appeared: 'smart people', 'creative people', 'artists', 'scientists', 'mathematicians', 'engineers', 'polymaths' etc...
The word 'hacker' is a feel-good word for us programmers: we feel that we are more than just programmers, we are some kind of 'polymaths'. But the truth is that so are other smart people: noone should think that a very smart mathematicin, phyiscists, other engineers cannot be good in other disciplines. (And engineers especially were always a bit polymaths, because ergonomy, technical difficulties and business considerations always were there paralelly.) As it is with every successful essayists, pg's essays have some feel-good values. As I grow older I no more like the feel-good component of essays. I am not a hcker, I am an engineer, and I was that ever. This does not mean that I have to be totally idiot in every other disciplines, but being good at something requires lots of practice. People are called engineers because they practiced engineering a lot, people are called mathematicians because they practiced mathematics a lot, etc...
If somebody could be called a 'hacker' it is the caliber of somebody like von Neumann, but even him we call just a 'mathematician' (and we call Einstein 'just' a physicist). Why previous generations did not need the word 'hacker'? Why we suddenly need this word for no other reasons of feeling good?
- j_baker 16y agoWhat's wrong with feeling good? I, for one, like feeling good. And the reason previous generations didn't need the word "hacker" is simply because computers hadn't been invented yet. But computing is hardly the first field with this kind of verbal distinction. What's the difference between a reporter and a journalist? Or a painter and an artist? Or an actor and a star?
- nadam 16y agoI think programmers are special kind of engineers. We could call them software engineers. My feeling is that the word 'hacker' is invented to state that hackers are somehow more than engineers. As if engineers were dumb people without creativity, who can only follow predefined processes. As if there were no engineer geniuses. As if engineers could not be enthusiast and as if sometimes engineering could not be treated as art the same way programming can be. 'Hacker' is a romantic word some people use to describe _themselves_, not a word society describes these people. In my opinion this wording is not really necessary. There were/are/will-be bad/good/exceptionally-good engineers in history of mankind. I just have a feeling that 200 years later the word 'hacker' will be forgotten but the word engineer will still live. (This is just my feeling.)
- SapphireSun 16y agoThank you. I have trouble understanding how this is even an argument. Maybe the word hacker will still be around, maybe not. Being creative, academically informed, and practically skilled will always be around.