[Gnu-arch-users] Re: [OT] engineering ethics and rhetoric in the modern age

[Zack Brown]

So, the point of your long post below seems to be that there are certain
issues of truth that should be considered in a rational and scientific way,
and that you have been trying to do that.

If I understand it correctly, that's a point you've made on this list
many times before in various ways. I agree: it would be good if people
could set aside their emotions, their personal feelings, their subjective
interpretations, and consider the issue of version control from a perspective
of objectivity and rationality.

Now, the argument that I'm making is not in opposition to your point about
the need to consider things objectively and scientifically. I don't dispute
that those are good values, and would be good to apply in the case of arch
and version control.

The argument I've made in this thread is that you discourage people from
participating in that kind of objective and scientific discussion, by treating
them poorly.

Now as you've said (if I've got it right), you believe that it shouldn't
matter how you treat them, because the objective truth should shine through
such mundane and petty concerns.

Ideally, you would be right. It would be possible for people to belittle
us and insult us all day, day after day, and we would have the fortitude to
continue to consider their remarks only for the objective, scientific value
they represented. And I agree with you that it is a general human failing
for someone to be unable to do that.

So obviously, the only conclusion to draw here is that the Subversion people
and everyone else who allows their personal feelings to get in the way of the
scientific, objective truths you wish to explain to them, are in the wrong,
and you are in the right. All of those people should change, and be better
able to deal with those scientific, objective truths.

Now, assuming I've understood everything you've said, and not misconstrued
it, I think I get your position. And as I said, it's one you've presented
here before.

The point I'd like to make is that people *don't* just deal with raw objective
truth. You may rail, "but they should, but they should," all you want. But
as should be clear from your countless experiences, they don't.

Now *if* (it's a big if, at this point) you were able to treat them as
equals, i.e. not as people with nothing but acquiescence to offer, and *if*
you were able to avoid the belittlement, the accusations, the protestions
that you only represent the pure truth and should thus be believed, *then*
the situation would be quite different.

You see, there are reasons why people don't like to be treated that way,
and those reasons quite properly influence their judgement of whether someone
should be listened to: whether that someone's arguments should be considered
or discarded without full consideration.

It's not feasible for one person to really exert their mind in a particular
direction just because someone else tells them to. You can imagine that the
people you talk to have also experienced other people, different from you,
telling them to think deeply about a great many diverse things, and to come
to conclusions that you yourself would disagree with. And each of these
requested exertions could consume significant fractions of a limited life-span.

Now these Subversion people or whomever, in order to make their own
determination of where their mental energies should go, have had to develop
heuristics that enable them to identify when the person speaking to them is
worth listening to, and when not.

In your case, they can see that you are a good programmer, and that some
of your ideas on the surface have merit. Perhaps if they choose to delve
deeper they see that the merit goes deeper than the surface. The point of
this paragraph is that these people do see at least something in you that
might give them reason to exert themselves in the ways you request of them.

Then on the other hand, they see that you have various "character flaws"
(to use your phrase), and these they also must take into consideration.
They consider that their objections are met with ridicule. They consider that
you exhort them to "just think harder", as if their normal way of thinking
was not strong enough. They consider that you say things like, "Suppose
you were a complete idiot: even so, you should be able to understand "X"
(so just _try_)," as if they were not already trying to understand "X",
and as if to admit that they were already trying, by your words, would be
to admit they were less than idiots.

They consider all these things, and they come to the conclusion that you
should be avoided. They conclude that you don't make *enough* sense and that
you are not helpful *enough* for them to make the effort needed to fully
clarify your ideas in their minds. They come to the conclusion that other
directions would be better for them. There are many paths to the truth.
They decide that you, Tom, are not essential for it.

And this is a *good* conclusion for them to draw. They really can't just think
and think and think about some arbitrary idea just because some stranger tells
them to. They must choose who to listen to, and so they make that choice. In
some cases, they choose to killfile you. They choose to never hear you again
in the future. They choose to warn others about you. They choose to fork
your project and take on the burden of trying to maintain it themselves.

Now you are absolutely right that the human animal should be able to consider
the ideas presented by anyone at all, and consider them until the truth
is known. No matter how many nutcases, fanatics, pamphleteers and whatnot
accost them in the street or on a mailing list, people should be able to
listen carefully to each of those people, collect all the ideas presented,
weigh them objectively, and come to the proper determination of truth.

In fact, those nutcases and pamphleteers, themselves human and sharing in
that same excellent quality, would also have done all of this already and
would not be nutcases at all, but clear proponents of truth. We would all,
through our lives, have considered ideas properly, weighed them, and come to
the truth of the world. And we would all have known, as a result of this,
that arch was always the One True Way, and all other ways were mere shams
and fiction, propounded by no one. We would see your shining objectivity
and truth, Tom, not as something new, but as something we had all known all
our lives, because it was true.  And we would have no need of mailing lists
to debate these things, or even of a revision control system; because all
false modifications to programs would be known to be false before they were
ever added, and we could create the perfect arch program on the first try,
in a world that would never need such a program. And we could worship it as
a perfect abstract idea, that would be so, so useful to people if only they
would ever make a mistake.

That's exactly how the world should be, Tom. You and I are in complete
agreement.

Be well,
Zack

On Mon, Sep 22, 2003 at 04:49:32PM -0700, Tom Lord wrote:
> 
> 
> (original thread was
>    Re: [Gnu-arch-users] Why so many version control projects?
> )
> 
> 
> Wow.  Schematically, just to get it out of the way, a lot of this
> thread has gone:
> 
>       Tom: "X"
>       Zack: "Y" is false.   The real problem here is that
>               insist on "Y", which is obnoxious.
>       Tom: I didn't say "Y".   Perhaps there is a miscommunication
>              because of the word choice.   "X" could be reprhased and
>              further explained as "X'", not "Y".
>       Zack: You just don't get it.  You keep saying "Y" and
>             insisting on that, which is obnoxious.  No wonder
>               people aren't doing what you think is the right thing:
>               it's your own fault for obnoxiously insisting on "Y".
> 
> Please imagine a long series of never-resolving messages of the form:
> 
>       Tom: "X!!!  Learn to read!  Suppose you were a complete idiot:
>              even so, you should be able to understand "X" (so just
>              _try_)."
> 
>       Zack: "Y?!?!?   You jerk.  You're calling me an idiot?
>               Alright, now you're in trouble."
> 
> 
> That's boring.  Instead, I wanted to focus on what could be called the
> "ad hominem" attacks in Zack's message.  I don't really care to defend
> myself against them ("Oh, I piss some people off?  Go figure.").   I
> do want to pull into view how they are being used in "threads like
> this" and why that is a Bad Thing.  I'd like to try to elevate the
> dialog to something more interesting.
> 
>     >> Tom:
> 
>     >> You're assuming that I'm reacting to disagreement.  In the case
>     >> of svn, I'm not reacting to disagreement.  I'm reacting to
>     >> refusal to understand/consider the issues well enough to form a
>     >> disagreement, in the face of ample overtures laying out the
>     >> basics and offering to work through the details.
> 
>     >> I'm reacting to a breakdown of how civilized engineers in positions of
>     >> social responsibility (a condition both I and the svn engineers find
>     >> ourselves in) should behave.   I don't see a disagreement:  I see a
>     >> breakdown of those extra-economic processes by which engineers provide
>     >> checks and balances on the economic authorities within whose domains
>     >> they operate.
> 
>     > Zack:
> 
>     > Again: your ego is preventing you from considering the issue clearly.
>     > You see only stubbornness and inability in the people who don't do
>     > things the way you feel they should be done.
> 
> I said nothing about stubbornness or inability in certain people.
> That is your inference, and it is a false inference that precludes a
> calm, critical analysis of the situation.
> 
> I spoke about "a breakdown of those extra-economic processes by which
> engineers provide checks and balances on the economic authorities
> within whose domains they operate".  Such a failure isn't necessarily
> caused by a personal weakness such as stubbornness or an absense of
> competence such as an inability to provide those checks and balances.
> Personal weaknesses or incompetence are sometimes _sufficient_ to
> cause such a failure, but they not _necessary_ to cause such a
> failure.  I would guess that, most often, in the big picture, when
> such failures occur, such personal failings are _not_ the cause.
> (If only it were that simple....)
> 
> I have pointed out a situation which is relatively uncontroversial.
> Even you yourself expressed agreement with the technical details of
> how the collective engineering process has failed.
> 
> _You_ seem to have concluded that:
> 
>       a) I am therefore asserting the existence of a character flaws
>            or incompetence in certain individuals.
> 
>       b) Since such an assertion is obviously obnoxious, the real
>            problem is a character flaw in me.
> 
> The first problem is that (a) is false and that therefore, (b) is
> unsupported.   Now, don't get me wrong -- like everyone else, I have
> my share of character flaws -- but the particular one I am accused of
> here exists only in your imagination -- only in those things you have
> imagined me to be saying which I have not actually said.   Those
> things which I have pointed out that I did not say only to have you
> ignore those parts of my reply.
> 
> The second problem is that the "systems failure" I've pointed out (in
> our collective engineering processes, regarded as a whole) is, if not
> itself an example, at least is "of a kind" with the kinds of failures
> that waste billions of dollars, ruin lives, and kill people.  The kind
> of failure I've pointed out, even if this is a minor example, is of
> the sort that is one of the _central_concerns_ of socially responsible
> conduct for engineers.  (For the record, I don't think this one is a
> trivial instance.)  Yet your response is reductionist.  Your response
> seeks to reduce the entire issue to one of "personalities" which is to
> say, it seeks to deny the very existence of that central concern of
> engineering.  I'll explain that "central concern" in greater detail
> starting 2 paragraphs hence).
> 
> This is why I said earlier that your mythologizing is harmful.  Your
> soap-opera stories a kind of cognative pollution.  Yours is an attack
> on the very idea of a rational, critical discourse concerning an
> engineering problem that crosses the political boundaries of projects
> and companies.
> 
> I'll say it again differently by explaining that "central concern": as
> engineers, we often deal in "hard reality" -- facts which are true
> regardless of how people feel about them.  PI is irrational, and so
> forth.  As politicians (including the political roles of project
> volunteer, project maintainer, employee, employer, supplier, and
> consumer) we deal with "soft reality" -- facts which are true
> _precisely_because_ people feel a certain way about them, often by
> choice.
> 
> The facts of hard reality are immutable.   _Some_ of the facts of soft
> reality are mutable.
> 
> In our modes of political organization (e.g., projects, companies) we
> attempt to use techniques defined in terms of soft reality to manage,
> to control, to arrange elements which are goverened by the laws of
> hard reality.   We decide, for example, to direct labor towards
> working out a particular mathematical construct (a program).
> 
> Collectively, as a species and a civilization, as our understanding of
> both hard and soft reality advances, our techniques for that
> intervention -- our ability to _use_ hard reality by means of soft
> reality mechanisms -- grows to profound, super-human scales.   We can
> build nuclear weapons.    We can grow crops in a desert.   We can
> redirect rivers, turn ocean bays to fresh-water ponds, extinguish
> species, create new forms of life -- and deploy a single program on
> millions of computers, or govern the conduct of dozens or hundreds of
> volunteer contributors.
> 
> A priori, hard reality constrains soft reality -- but it is clearly a
> cold comfort.  The "constraint" has the form of "if you, the people of
> the world, try to do something really stupid -- great havoc will be
> unleashed upon you".
> 
> Therefore, it is rational to examine, in a direct and critical way,
> the nature of what it is that soft reality is attempting to do with
> hard reality.
> 
> As engineers, we occupy an interesting position.   We are right on the
> frontier between hard and soft reality.   We are pretty much the
> boundary between the two.
> 
> And that gives us a special burden:   When the soft reality "orders"
> (either directly, in the form of edict, or indirectly, in the form of
> custom) -- when the soft reality "orders" us to attempt something with
> hard reality -- we are the LAST LINK IN THE CHAIN with the opportunity
> to THINK about what we are doing.   We are the last link in the chain
> with the opportunity to say: "No, sorry, `soft reality' has just hit
> the blue-screen-of-death.   `soft reality' needs a patch here.   We're
> not going to do that."
> 
> A long time ago, it was hard to become one who we might today label
> "engineer".   At times, for example, it required a long apprenticeship
> and the transmission of knowledge that was not widely broadcast.   It
> was easy to boot out people who shouldn't be there -- who didn't
> perceive or didn't live up to the responsibilities.
> 
> Even in recent times -- 30 years ago, perhaps -- it was _largely_ a
> very controlled transmission of knowledge.  The social responsibility
> I refer to -- the responsibility to be critical and analytical and to
> be prepared to say "NO" -- was whispered.  Not only was it taboo to
> discuss that duty too loudly, but it was even encouraged to say "NO"
> very indirectly, essentially by sabotage ("Sorry, we tried, but -- uh,
> well, there was a gamma burst of zeta particles in the funkobulator
> which caused a complete sieze-up of the grokalator.  Hey, it's rare,
> but it happens.  I'll bet you can collect an insurance claim on it.")
> 
> My personal belief is that these days, when essentially all
> engineering knowledge is broadcast everywhere and (especially in
> software) anyone can join the game -- the taboo must fall.
> 
> Selfless, critical analysis of the cumulative effect of our actions,
> transcending the political boundaries of projects and companies, must
> be a first-class topic of discussion and trying to achieve such
> analysis a new, unembarassed habit.
> 
> Your replies -- your mythologizing -- your "soap-operafication" of the
> projects and companies -- and your sloppy, rhetorically convenient
> misreading of what I've said -- all these things must go.  Sorry.
> Those things are excuses not reasons -- and the subject under
> consideration deserves reason, not excuse-making.
> 
> One could even relate the nature of your replies to scientifically and
> politically naive criticisms of the recent actions of the US in Iraq.
> I will not, in this message, take a position on those actions.
> However, some criticism of them focuses entirely on "personalities"
> (especially of political leaders) and on the absolute preeminance of
> political constructions such as the UN or ideas about the nature of
> state sovereignty.  Such criticisms are non-responsive and harmful.
> They deny the scientific and engineering realities that transcend the
> power of the political sovereignties and seek to exclude consideration
> of those realities from the debate.  Those scientific and engineering
> realities (the modern affordability and ease with which considerable
> havoc may be unleashed by an infinitessimal minority) are the core
> premise of the action and, consequently, criticism of the action
> should address those issues directly, in those terms -- not wish them
> away.  Wearing my engineer's hat, I don't care much about assertions
> that the war in Iraq is an "oil grab" -- I want to hear what would be
> a better way to address the threat of technologically capable,
> non-transparent, economically and scientifically resourceful political
> peers with expressly hostile intentions.
> 
> In the free software world, what "havoc" may be wrought is surely far
> more mediated -- such trivial issues as wasted labor, business
> inefficiency, mis-educated youngsters, Internet security
> vulnerabilities, lost opportunities, and so forth.  I make no moral
> equivication of those issues with the issues at hand in international
> politics.
> 
> Yet I do not think that the lesser issues of free software are without
> moral and ethical and practical consequence.   They are, very much, an
> appropriate subject for critical, analytical discourse concerning how
> they are impacted by the decisions and actions of hackers, projects,
> businesses, and customers.
> 
> For such a discourse to be possible, one must be able to cite, without
> broader implication, the violation of a proposed invariant -- in order
> to initiate analysis of the relevance of the invariant and the causes
> of its violation.
> 
> That's what I did.  That's all I did.
> 
> The proposed invariant was roughly: "If we're all going to be staking
> large claims to volunteer labor, economic resources, and prospective
> customer mind-share for revision control -- then there should at least
> be some demonstrable effort on the part of the engineers to be on the
> same page with respect to the design space and its implications.  This
> ain't rocket science, after all -- but it does have huge
> consequences."
> 
> Seeing that invariant violated, I say: "Something serious has gone
> wrong, not sure why yet.   We aren't living up to that
> responsibility.   I think I've done my part but it's like I'm talking
> to a brick wall."
> 
> In reply, you made many ad hominem attacks against me and twisted my
> words quite excessively.
> 
> Now we have two problems.
> 
> Get it?
> 
> 
> -t
> 

-- 
Zack Brown