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It's alteration of an established system with self-beneficial results in mind. It's a hack.

• suivix 15y ago
  Is a very complex alteration involving modified DNA and extensive research and testing. Everything is established until you change it. Most medicine is just a chemical compound you ingest, which would mean they are all 'hacks' with your perspective. The word trivializes the whole process.
  • phuff 15y ago
    The process isn't a hack, but the end result is :) Not a "quick and cheap dirty hack" but a "I've manipulated a system to do something different or better in a novel way" sense of a hack. My wife had epidurals during the delivery of our children. That, even though it was a medical procedure, was totally a hack :) Inserting novacaine into the spinal column to deaden nerve receptors == hacking the body :) That doesn't mean it wasn't serious business or a big deal. It just means that we figured out a neat way to manipulate an existing system for beneficial results.
  • artursapek 15y ago
    I think it's glorification that's the problem. I would consider medicine a hack, hacks aren't divine achievements.
• rhino42 15y ago
  Really, all technological improvements in the last few centuries are "hacks" then, in a sense. Each time we write a piece of software, we are taking an existing system (a computer), and altering it to perform a somewhat different task. Hack. Each time I optimize a DSP system to take 10% less resources, its a hack. Just stick 100 or 200 of these together, and we have moore's law.
• markkat 15y ago
  That definition is so broad, it could be applied to almost any action that has benefit. Foe example, would mean that warming bread to make it crusty and crunchy is a hack?