3 ms·

Canon is excellent, but I fear it wouldn't catch on due to its religious origins / connotations.

• palsir 6y ago
  what are the religious origins/connotations? That various religions also have a canon and apocrypha?
• Twisol 6y ago
  I can appreciate that "canon" is used in religious contexts, but its meaning and origin go back further than that. Wiktionary (hardly the best source, I know) lists three secular meanings before the religious ones begin. The most relevant is this one: > A group of literary works that are generally accepted as representing a field. Also, the coinage "fanon" (as in derivative works by a fanbase) comes directly from the treatment of the source material as "canonical". (Frankly, "canonical" is the best argument I can make for "canon".)
  • romanoderoma 6y ago
    > but its meaning and origin go back further than that master/slave goes back to Mesopotamia, 4 thousands years ago and was used to describe the relationship between men and gods > Man was believed to have been created to serve the gods, or perhaps wait on them: the god is lord or master (belu) and man is servant or slave (ardu) I guess being that old is not good enough nowadays
    • franga2000 6y ago
      But git doesn't use master/slave (noun). It uses master as an adjective ("master branch"). Think cassettes and vinyl records or "master boot record". It means being the definitive source of truth and has been used in that form for centuries [citation needed, but I don't remember where I read it]. This isn't just an instance of "not old enough", it's an instance of it not even being the same word, so I guess you just can't win this...
      • romanoderoma 6y ago
        Yep I made the same point here https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23970140 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23970140