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Editorial Linux Community Hit by the Blight of Social Justice Warfare, A Great Purge is Coming

Well, it was you who said Aristotle was Plato's pupil. The mere fact his anthology is totally against the former says volumes. You cannot disprove something without prior examination.

They're both advocates for an elite class (and slavery to boot). They had different ways of going about it, but the goal was the same. Every Greek philosopher outside the Ionian tradition pretty much stems from Pythagoras. Even if they varied, they're all Rationalists.

The Ionians OTOH (who eventually lost influence ) were far from elitist.. They were the practical, down to earth guys.. More empiricist compared to Pythagoras' rationalism. Many involved in mercantilism and other common trades. None of them argued for special classes to run society, or spoke in abstractions, or wanted special people designated to rule and/or know the "mathematical mysteries" of the universe or any such nonsense. They didn't want to keep anyone in the dark. They wanted knowledge to be available to everyone and used in everyday, practical situations. If I'm an advocate of anyone in Greece, it was these guys.

But I still don't know what this has to do with Linux.
 
He literally attended Plato's academy, so yeah, he was.



You can when it has literally no foundation, because there is literally nothing comprehensible to examine.

Pretty much what's going on here.
You know, to make a point, Ayn Rand always dismissed questions about God with, "The fact that there is no proof dispells there being an answer to that question". You cannot prove a negative.
I think what she missed was there needn't be. She was just looking for proof for the irrational to prove God. See the strawman? She was looking at the wrong place. She already acknowledged "her rationality" kept her from answering that question, she just didn't finish it by saying 'reason', it is.
 
He's also the one that adopted this, or did I misunderstand?
He added it to the source. Motive still unknown.
 
They're both advocates for an elite class (and slavery to boot). They had different ways of going about it, but the goal was the same. Every Greek philosopher outside the Ionian tradition pretty much stems from Pythagoras. Even if they varied, they're all Rationalists.

The Ionians OTOH (who eventually lost influence ) were far from elitist.. They were the practical, down to earth guys.. More empiricist compared to Pythagoras' rationalism. Many involved in mercantilism and other common trades. None of them argued for special classes to run society, or spoke in abstractions, or wanted special people designated to rule and/or know the "mathematical mysteries" of the universe or any such nonsense. They didn't want to keep anyone in the dark. They wanted knowledge to be available to everyone and used in everyday, practical situations. If I'm an advocate of anyone in Greece, it was these guys.

But I still don't know what this has to do with Linux.
Well, race to the bottom in a zero-sum environment can pull even the strictest rational minds to frailty.
Just look at Justinian's case. He who simplified law and unified court fell under scrutiny in his old age: riots broke out, the treasurer bribed them in hopes of succession. Justinian could not reach the fundamental tenet of the his own frailty. He relied on those around him and failed to see the defiant closest to him.
One of my misalignments is the numeral system. I think the relative 'infinite' numbers are naturals and to the contrary transcendentals are the actual 'finite' constant ones.
 
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24 pages in and this is where we've arrived from the knee jerk reaction to Linus Tovald's abrasiveness.
Off-The-Rails.jpg
 
He added it to the source. Motive still unknown.

I can only assume he had his reasons and we're playing speculation game in something we cannot possibly understand.

As I said before this became a thread, essentially...

24 pages in and this is where we've arrived from the knee jerk reaction to Linus Tovald's abrasiveness.
View attachment 108155

One user insists on derailing it constantly into something about laws of thermodynamics and Ayn Rand territory. So yeah, pretty much. The topic is hopeless. I feel like a headless chicken.
 
I can only assume he had his reasons and we're playing speculation game in something we cannot possibly understand.

As I said before this became a thread, essentially...



One user insists on derailing it constantly into something about laws of thermodynamics and Ayn Rand territory. So yeah, pretty much. The topic is hopeless. I feel like a headless chicken.

I still find him interesting though.. just don't know what it always has to do with this topic. Even tangentially. But since I'm a Christian, it's interesting hearing about Justinian... especially from someone in Turkey apparently.

I personally don't think Byzantine downfall had anything to do with their own leaders. It's all the West's fault. Everything is the West's fault. Except Ayn Rand. That's Russia's fault. :p
 
I can only assume he had his reasons and we're playing speculation game in something we cannot possibly understand.
Well, think about it. The fact he unilaterally added something extremely controversial to the source is, in itself, a violation of the Code of Conflict. Consider that specific edit as you're reading it:
Code of Conflict said:
The Linux kernel development effort is a very personal process compared to “traditional” ways of developing software. Your code and ideas behind it will be carefully reviewed, often resulting in critique and criticism.[1] The review will almost always require improvements to the code before it can be included in the kernel.[2] Know that this happens because everyone involved wants to see the best possible solution for the overall success of Linux.[3] This development process has been proven to create the most robust operating system kernel ever, and we do not want to do anything to cause the quality of submission and eventual result to ever decrease.[4]

If however, anyone feels personally abused, threatened, or otherwise uncomfortable due to this process, that is not acceptable. If so, please contact the Linux Foundation’s Technical Advisory Board at <tab@lists.linux-foundation.org>, or the individual members, and they will work to resolve the issue to the best of their ability. For more information on who is on the Technical Advisory Board and what their role is, please see:

http://www.linuxfoundation.org/projects/linux/tab

As a reviewer of code, please strive to keep things civil and focused on the technical issues involved.[5] We are all humans, and frustrations can be high on both sides of the process. Try to keep in mind the immortal words of Bill and Ted, “Be excellent to each other.”[6]
  1. There was no review.
  2. No improvements were allowed.
  3. It didn't happen.
  4. Undeniably did decrease.
  5. What's technical about the Code of Conduct?
  6. At least a warning would have been nice.


The move also violates many points from the Code of Conduct:
Code of Conduct said:
Gracefully accepting constructive criticism
Didn't accept any criticism.
Code of Conduct said:
Focusing on what is best for the community
Dictation is rarely best for any community.
Code of Conduct said:
Showing empathy towards other community members
He basically said "deal with it" and "vacation!"


His email makes it sound like he was harassed into changing it:
Torvalds said:
This week people in our community confronted me about my lifetime of not understanding emotions.
Not allowed:
Code of Conduct said:
Public or private harassment


Support Code of Conflict (because removed without consent of the community through which it was adopted) or Code of Conduct (because he just violated it by adopting it), everyone has grounds to be mad at Torvalds.
 
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As discussed previously, "fairness" is highly contextual. In many cases, fairness is an impossibility.
That's a contradictory statement. If fairness is contextual (which it obviously is) then it's also a matter of degree (given that context implies balancing various relevant factors). Can you show me an example in which the only possibility is zero fairness?
Who invented Linux? 'Nuff said.
Again, boilerplate authoritarianism. "He invented it, so he is and will always be the most suited person to rule over it." This is a horribly uncritical and naive approach to anything at all.
None of the above. The change is rejected and the project manager moves on. "New developer" gets a "deal with it" response. Linux Foundation isn't paying Torvalds to corral and train noobs. They're paying him to make the Linux Kernel better. "New developer" either keeps trying (and each submission evaluated based on merit) or stops contributing.
What you're describing here is option 2. So, definitely not "none of the above". And not an approach conducive to improving development. The best possible outcome of this appeoach is maintaining the status quo, though the risk of things going wrong is significant. There is essentially zero chance of actually making anything better with this approach. Classic poor management, and far from an optimal approach.
Question: do you have any programming background? Most big applications like Linux rely on compartmentalization where individuals focus on specific areas. Example: Sarah/Sage Sharp was working on the USB3 Host Controller driver. Most of the code is isolated in that regard. The only discussion arises when there is interaction between components. Who has to iron that out right now? Torvalds. If someone doesn't do something right, it's Torvalds that has to point out. This naturally makes him the villain for people being called out. If not him, someone else has to. When you're screening hundreds, if not thousands of edits per day, someone contributing garbage is likely to make any human frustrated. Abrasiveness comes with the territory.
Again: classic poor management. If he can't do his job without resorting to verbal abuse, he needs to lower his stress levels, delegate more, and check his ego. A high workload is no excuse for being an asshole, particularly when he's in a position to alleviate this himself. If his pride and/or ego is stopping him from getting someone to share the workload (for example due to a belief that only he can do the job properly), that's immature and piss-poor leadership (at the very least, he could hire and train someone). With Linux being as massive as it is, it's rather absurd if this comes down to a single person anyhow. Not to mention that this is very risky. What happens if he gets hit by a truck tomorrow?

And no, I don't have a software background, but project management isn't that discipline specific (and I'm reasonably familiar with project development/management models stemming from the software world). Compartmentalizing in projects isn't exactly a difficult project to grasp either. Managers needing to make sure discrete parts of a project work together is quite common in many fields.
Uh? Looks like you tried to define software and...failed? Programs (which are software) have one purpose: execute. You're talking about project management which, as I discussed above, is pretty much Torvalds.
So your car is a car because its engine starts? Sorry, but that statement is pure nonsense. Your car is a car because its combination of affordances make powered transportation possible through its use. This requires it to work to be a functioning car, but working is not what makes it a car. You're mistaking means (code that will compile/execute) with ends (functioning software). The former facilitates and makes possible the latter, but is only a part of the whole. Unless, of course, you're taking about art projects or other similar "non-useful" software. I'm quite sure Linux doesn't fit that category. The code wouldn't be written unless it was there to serve a purpose beyond executing. Or are you saying people write millions of lines of code just to see if it'll run? Software is made to fulfill a purpose, do a job, be a tool, not "to execute".
Linux is Torvalds' baby and he wants to see it grow.
Yet his management style (and management structure) is clearly not ideal for this purpose. A leader interested in making the optimal product would see this and work to rectify it. It would seem that he has, given that he chose to implement a code that lays the groundwork for avoiding harm from behaviour that he himself has a propensity towards.
Well, greatness does not require second parties. That is what makes someone great because if your reference is someone else, you aren't: it is as simple as that. You need be over the frontier where the tide breaks, else you are an employee which, so these idiots think, is a substitute for greatness.
Classic libertarian nonsense. Denying that you're building on your experience (which includes other people, unless you were raised by wolves, I guess) is naive, not "great". Nobody exists in a vacuum, and we've all learned everything we know from other people. Greatness requires a community.
I didn't read Aristotle. Not being too proud like some who act dismissive though in relative positions...
So when you admit ignorance it's honorable, but when I do so it's "dismissive" and "proud"? Nice double standard you've got there.
You cannot disprove something without prior examination.
You can when it has literally no foundation, because there is literally nothing comprehensible to examine.
Pretty much what's going on here.
Yeah. Isn't this the whole reason why the criterion for scientific proof was changed from verifiability to falsifiability? If something can't be examined, and thus the statement can't be falsified, it is by default not a scientific statement. Dismissing it is as such not "disproving" it (as that would be impossible), but dismissing it as a valid argument in the first place. Which is sound scientific practice. I suppose you could call the process of discovering that there's nothing to examine "examination", but then you're just nit-picking.

Also, @mtcn77 , I'm still waiting for you to address any of the counterarguments leveled against you on this topic. You've conveniently led this whole charade into a quagmire of discussing whether ancient Greek philosophers were elitist (they all were; they lived in a heavily socially stratified society, one where slavery was accepted, and which was convinced of its own superiority to all other cultures, so expecting them not to be would be quite unreasonable), but this has nothing to do with the topic, and there have been plenty of counterarguments presented to you that you still haven't even come close to addressing. Frankly, I'm getting tired of you refusing to respect the other forum members here enough to actually address our concerns, so if you're at all interested in not coming off as dismissive and disrespectful I'd suggest actually treating this as a conversation, not a fight.
 
That's a contradictory statement. If fairness is contextual (which it obviously is) then it's also a matter of degree (given that context implies balancing various relevant factors). Can you show me an example in which the only possibility is zero fairness?
Nature doesn't fancy fairness. Example: Down's Syndrome.

There is essentially zero chance of actually making anything better with this approach.
Linux's version history disagrees.

Yet his management style (and management structure) is clearly not ideal for this purpose. A leader interested in making the optimal product would see this and work to rectify it. It would seem that he has, given that he chose to implement a code that lays the groundwork for avoiding harm from behaviour that he himself has a propensity towards.
The fact Linux is still charging on decades later and is installed on more devices than any other operating system proves otherwise.
 
Nature doesn't fancy fairness. Example: Down's Syndrome.


Linux's version history disagrees.


The fact Linux is still charging on decades later and is installed on more devices than any other operating system proves otherwise.
Nope. All that shows is that the status quo is one where Linux is useful, and that it has thus far developed in useful ways. On the flip side, it has grown by many orders of magnitude in the meantime. This means that more resources need to be spent on development (to optimize for new use cases, fix the increasing number of bugs found, and all the other complications inherent with a larger user base), and more people need to be involved. At some point, likely in the near future, maintaining the status quo would have lead to serious issues, whether in terms of management, strategy, interpersonal relations, or all of the above. Instead, Torvalds has taken steps to avoid this, as any good manager should when the enterprise in question has seen a prolonged period of growth. Growth requires change. Not changing means not adapting to new conditions, which almost inevitably leads to bad things happening. Linux development now isn't what it was ten years ago, and it's regulations and norms need to reflect that.

As for fairness: I suppose you're right there. Fairness is a human concept, and thus doesn't apply outside of human culture (though evidence does exist of similar values among many animals). Still, this doesn't really apply: if the thing in question is beyond the control of human culture, fairness as a concept loses any meaning in relation to it. The existence of genetic mutations is not a moral quandary, it's a fact of life. Morals do not apply, and thus neither does fairness. I guess I should change my question: can you show me an example where human decision-making is involved where the only possible outcome is zero fairness?
 
Nope. All that shows is that the status quo is one where Linux is useful, and that it has thus far developed in useful ways. On the flip side, it has grown by many orders of magnitude in the meantime. This means that more resources need to be spent on development (to optimize for new use cases, fix the increasing number of bugs found, and all the other complications inherent with a larger user base), and more people need to be involved. At some point, likely in the near future, maintaining the status quo would have lead to serious issues, whether in terms of management, strategy, interpersonal relations, or all of the above. Instead, Torvalds has taken steps to avoid this, as any good manager should when the enterprise in question has seen a prolonged period of growth. Growth requires change. Not changing means not adapting to new conditions, which almost inevitably leads to bad things happening. Linux development now isn't what it was ten years ago, and it's regulations and norms need to reflect that.
All good points. And very true. Linux is evolving and it's management techniques must evolve with it. However, the technological evolution of a thing must be made to benefit the technology, not the social constructs of the day.
can you show me an example where human decision-making is involved where the only possible outcome is zero fairness?
War
 
Nope. All that shows is that the status quo is one where Linux is useful, and that it has thus far developed in useful ways. On the flip side, it has grown by many orders of magnitude in the meantime. This means that more resources need to be spent on development (to optimize for new use cases, fix the increasing number of bugs found, and all the other complications inherent with a larger user base), and more people need to be involved. At some point, likely in the near future, maintaining the status quo would have lead to serious issues, whether in terms of management, strategy, interpersonal relations, or all of the above. Instead, Torvalds has taken steps to avoid this, as any good manager should when the enterprise in question has seen a prolonged period of growth. Growth requires change. Not changing means not adapting to new conditions, which almost inevitably leads to bad things happening. Linux development now isn't what it was ten years ago, and it's regulations and norms need to reflect that.
Except that you're forgetting Linux Kernel is limited in scope to the kernel. Most of the growth you're describing is implemented by other developers on top of the kernel (e.g. Google with Android). Kernel contributors are called "maintainers" for a reason.

If you looked through that version history website, you'd see what I am talking about. For example, there's no technical reason for 4.0 to exist: Torvalds just wanted to change it.

can you show me an example where human decision-making is involved where the only possible outcome is zero fairness?
Bullying, dictatorships, majority mob rule, etc. Those in power do whatever they want because they answer to no one.

Which yes, Linux Kernel is that in many ways but again, it's Torvalds' baby.
 
All good points. And very true. Linux is evolving and it's management techniques must evolve with it. However, the technological evolution of a thing must be made to benefit the technology, not the social constructs of the day.
That is absolutely true. From where I stand, a good set of rules ensures this, as rules should be written to be as neutral as possible. Of course, enforcement and interpretation of the rules is dependent on all manner of social context, which is why we need multiple levels of courts and the like. Debate and critique of the rules and their interpretation is a constant necessity, and the organization should not only allow for, but facilitate this.

Excellent point.
 
Which yes, Linux Kernel is that in many ways but again, it's Torvalds' baby.
Yes, and all babies grow up and take on a life of their own. Linus might have recognized this and has, like any good parent would, taken a step back so the child can take it's own steps forward, metaphorically speaking of course.
 
By throwing it to the SJWs. Might as well have dug a grave for it himself.
 
What happens at the Maintainer Summit will determine if Linux has a future or not.
 
Well, think about it. The fact he unilaterally added something extremely controversial to the source is, in itself, a violation of the Code of Conflict.

That has nothing to do with my question. Why the tangent? My point and only point is you can't claim to know Linus's reasons and pretending to know them is folly.

What happens at the Maintainer Summit will determine if Linux has a future or not.

Ford has spoken!

Seriously, there is no way Linux is dying. Mark my words. It's way bigger than your fear of SJW's, and very very forkable. The GPL is time tested. Maybe the name will be shed, but "Linux" (as in binary compatability) is going nowhere. You guys are actually rather hilarious being this worried about this.

For example, there's no technical reason for 4.0 to exist: Torvalds just wanted to change it.

They stopped using technical reasons for major versions back in the 2.6 era dude.

Support Code of Conflict (because removed without consent of the community through which it was adopted) or Code of Conduct (because he just violated it by adopting it), everyone has grounds to be mad at Torvalds.

And one thing everyone seems to miss because I defend these things in concept (not implementation) is that I completely agree with that. I just don't think much will come of that other than the further ostracization of Torvalds, which as I said at the onset, is probably a GOOD thing for productivity globally.
 
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Think OpenOffice versus LibreOffice. The former is corporate and stale. The latter is non-corporate and thriving. With Linux Kernel, it's even worse because one major security vulnerability that goes unpatched means distros will jump ship from it. Linux could become irrelevant in less than a year if there is a major exodus of maintainers away from it.

Who said I was worried? Certainly not me.
 
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What was wrong with OpenOffice? I remember the first time I saw it was back when I was still in high school (it was also the first time I saw Linux PCs in the wild). Seems like a good free alternative to MS Office, which costs money.
 
Sun sold OpenOffice to Oracle. Most of the developers forked and continued development on LibreOffice. Oracle sold OpenOffice to Apache. Apache hasn't updated it since 2014. Even NeoOffice (Mac OS X compatible version), switched from OpenOffice to LibreOffice.
1280px-StarOffice_major_derivatives.svg.png
 
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Who said I was worried? Certainly not me.

The length of the thread and various vague statements of concern about the state of Linux's future must've fooled me... perhaps "worried" is the wrong word but there is certainly a ruckus over it. I really doubt anything will change that affects end users at all.
 
I'm a sucker for debate. :laugh:
 
These kinds of people have immense social pressure through crafty use of language, and people in general not wanting to be screamed at, and have their social lives smeared by, lunatics. A recent change to the way linux code is added allows a creator to redact their code from the kernel. So if someone pisses off SJWs in the coding world, they can be bullied (through threats to their career and social life typically) to remove their code from linux.

Stupid question: can Linus do this too?
 
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