New programming classics

Some guy posted an article about programming terms coined by people that somehow took off in their circles, based on a question on StackOverflow. Some of them picture anti-patterns, other indentation styles and so on... Very funny. I've seen a lot of "Yoda Conditions", "Pokémon Exception Handling" and "Ninja Comments" myself.

Read the article here.

The Atheism of Alain de Botton

Yesterday I attended a lecture by the philosopher Alain de Botton. Alain is a philosopher concerned with applications of philosophy in the daily life and practical questions, in the tradition of Michel de Montaigne. The lecture was specifically about his last book, Religion for Atheists.

What the heck?!?

In the book he argues that even atheists can extract good lessons from religion. He goes on describing these lessons on subjects like education and community. Assuming that God does not exist (Alian is a convicted atheist) the philosopher explains we can discard theist beliefs but copy the methods religion uses for perpetuate those beliefs.

Religion, as explains Mr. de Botton, uses intricate methods to teach lessons like, charity, loving your neighbor, temperance. He assumes humans have trouble learning and recalling these lessons, so we would need to listen the preachings over and over again, at moments we are receptive to the messages. This practice is well employed by the church, using very repetitive sermons and communal meals. So why don't we take those practices out of religion to the secular world, trying to teach, for example, moral values at a secular dinner?

Talking in moral values, the secular world has no place for teaching those, leaving up to religion to foist them on people. The university is an excellent place for learning technical knowledge, but nowadays lacks the participation of building good men, a role it once had in the past, as Alain points out. Should not university teach about what is good and bad, or how to live, how to be happy? The book has a few more examples, like art and architecture. I haven't finished it yet, but at this point I can already recommend it, I'm enjoying it a lot.

In the lecture Alain de Botton tried to distance himself from the called "new atheism", labels with big proponents like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens. He sees no point in mock people based on their beliefs. I tend to agree with him, however I find very difficult to not get pissed by some religious practices. But nowadays I'm starting to be less militant on religious topics, so perhaps I will try to have a posture more or less like that proposed by de Botton and his called "atheism 2.0".

It was a wonderful lecture. Mr. de Botton conducted it very well, clearly stating his points and keeping a good pace. Also, he seems to be a nice person, educated and always smiling. I even got an autograph! Yay!

Piano Playing

Hi!

I started to play Bach's English Suite in Gm, BWV 808. Beautiful tune! Let's see how long it will take...

By the way, I strongly recommend this recording by Glenn Gould.