What is “hacking”?
PrevNode LinkNextI also contrasted "conformism" (= playing by the rules of "society", what other people expect you to do, following superior orders, doing what you feel you are obliged to do, etc.) to "hacking" (a.k.a "action heroism"). Hacking is not limited to computer security exploitation, or even to creative software development.
Hacking involves:
Thinking outside the box. (
Both cups were poisoned. I had developed an immunity for the poison.
)Being resourceful.
Finding creative solutions.
Bending or defying the "laws"/guidelines.
Not accepting your "fate".
"David vs. Goliath" and its "Indiana Jones' Gun vs. Swordmaster" scene modernisation (which is funny now, and the Goliath story was likely equally as funny in ancient times). Moreover, the real-life Samantha Smith became "the child who slew two mighty superpowers", at the age of 10, by using international mail, and other 20th century technology (and not killing anyone).
"Craziness" / Nev'ua ( which was mistranslated as "prophecy"). I suspect "lenabé" in Biblical times originally meant to "act crazy", to "drive crazy", "to be crazy", "to seek [divine] guidance", including in today's casual senses. It involved: "funny"ness, exaggeration, song-and-poetry, emulation, contradicting one self, intimidation and fear (which can be fun in a way) - even blasphemy. Many Members of the appropriate sex nevertheless found it sexy.
Plato considered insanity as divine, and during his time, the good "stand-up philosophers" or nevi'im (and many similar phenomena in the Near East), were often funny, or otherwise exciting, exalting, non "original" (borrowed and built upon the works of their peers and predecessors), often seemingly or actually contradicted themselves, blasphemous or just seemingly "stupid", and didn't take themselves seriously. Although held with some contempt, they were highly coveted by Members of the appropriate sex.
Julian Jaynes hypothesised that the Nevi'im were Schizophrenic and hallucinated voices of "gods" (= "guidelines-generators") and who spoke in poems or rhymes. However, now I think most of the later ones were only hypomanic (= mild-mania) at worst, often spoke in prose or in free form verse, and often not only emulated, built-upon, parodied, or mocked their predecessors or contemporaries, but topped them.
And they were often accused of being "bullshit" artists, being blasphemous or stupid, and "contaminating the minds of the youth" and held in some contempt. Socrates, Galileo, Alexandre Dumas, Sarah Bernhardt, early films and film cartoons ( Walt Disney, Warner Bros, etc.) television in the 1970s (Sesame Street / etc.), video games starting from the 1980s, Role-playing games, Internet chat ( IRC / etc.), supermodels, reality TV show contestants, independent YouTube cover/etc. artists, bloggers, and social media. Like Qoheleth noted around 300 B.C.: "There is nothing new under the sun."
Just for the record, while I am enamoured with many YouTube cover artists, and whose songs comprise of most of the music I listen to, my sister, who is 5 years my junior and who has a Ph.D. in Computer Science (so she is intelligent and techsavvy), has a prejudice against them.
The Biblical Samson was not in general an action hero, but a classical "I'm taking them all with me" / "may my soul perish with philistines" tragic hero, who worked hard (and not smart!) and took many lives of (often innocent) people who cared about him.
Naturally, when software developers say "I hacked a Python script" or "The Linux kernel is a great hack" they mean that they were created or concieved with pleasure. The Ancient Hebrew verb ידע ("yada`", "lada`at") meant both "to know" and to "have had sex with". However, I hypothesised that it also meant "to create something with joy" and a linguist friend confirmed that. A female software developer who paid me to teach her the Perl programming language told me that writing a Perl script felt like giving birth for her.
As a result, I think "yada`" had some of the contemporary meaning of "hacking" despite some etymological erosion.
This corresponds with the "amateur" / "geeky" nature of workers loving/enjoying their work.
Also note that hacking sometimes does involve a prolonged and intense amount of work as opposed to the David vs. Goliath 's "taking the easy way out". David for example had likely spent many hours practicing his slingshot skills and honing them.
That put aside, despite common belief, NASA astronauts did use pencils in space at first, just like their Soviet peers. However, this solution was found to be lacking. As a result, space-friendly pens were developed (within budget) and used (including by the USSR cosmonauts).
Like the book "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" or the "There's more than one way to do it" adage indicate, there are many kinds of hacker monarchs (= "master hackers", "hacker kings/hacker queens", "messiahs") and looks or qualities can be deceiving.