C4I.org - Zen and the Art of Hacking - The Diigo Meta page

• 13 Aug 08
  

  Cherice Montgomery

  Fantastic article. Viewed conceptually, it offers a lot re: concepts of mentoring, change, paradigm shifts, perspective, education, learning.

  hacking hackers essays creativity innovation cognition mentoring perspective

  • "It comes down to a common quest   for knowledge," Knowles says. "Why does it do what it does? Who, what,   where, when, why, how?"

     

    Hackers are distinguished by their   hunger for knowledge. They long to see things whole and yearn to know how   things work. Their power derives from the critical knowledge that   leverages other knowledge, their enthusiasm from an adrenaline rush that   comes when they finally make that connection, solve that puzzle.
  • When the door against which you've   been banging your head suddenly dissolves and you slip effortlessly to the   next level--that's the joy of hacking
  • they see the world in the image of networks.
  • We discover in the process of   living life with gusto the boundaries we had better not cross, then learn   how to set limits from within. The risks must be real or the rewards   aren't real.

  • Hackers at their best are   trekkers who hike the peaks and valleys of the virtual world. The   infrastructure of the world is a puzzle invented to test their mettle.   They fail into failure again and again before failing into success: The   non-pattern of chaotic data suddenly coalesces, the dots connect and   anxiety vanishes.

     

    You see how it works! Bingo! You   understand how it all hangs together.
  • Technically, it's called "living   proleptically"--when a new possibility breaks into the present with such   compelling power that we have no choice but to live out of that vision as   if it's real. We adopt a new point of reference, and by living as if it   has already happened, we make it real.
  • He could never see the Big Picture so the details   never connected in a way that made sense."
  • what distinguishes the best hackers. "The   defining characteristic is they see the Big Picture," he says. "They have   incredible amounts of knowledge and have gone into things at incredibly   deep levels. There is such an immense base of knowledge about competing   technologies,
  • "Everyone specializes so much,"   Dark Tangent continues, "that it's important to know people in all the   different areas. You have to know what you don't need to know and you have   to know who you can call when you need to know it."
  • You can make it just   trading tokens of knowledge, the currency of hacking and advance through   'remote learning.' But the Network is not just computers, it's   knowledgeable people connected by computers."
  • Hackers have little patience with   people who want to be spoon-fed hard-earned knowledge and won't do the   homework.
  • you have to know where to look."
  • onnected with a mentor at a critical moment in his career.   That mentor taught him how to look through trash for hours to find the few   significant items that would let him gain entry
  • more importantly, his mentor taught him by example how to mentor.
  • being available to provide   information at the right moment to enable a learner to leverage what he   already knows,
  • defines the ideal coach.
  • She started asking specific, pointed questions about   networking. That earned her my undivided attention and assistance in   learning."
  • "You want to create hackers? Don't   tell them how to do this or that. Show them how to discover it for   themselves.
  • "managing your ego,"   which he does by hanging out with smart friends. That keeps the limits of   his own knowledge in perspective.
  • "I have   had to recognize that my perception of reality is fundamentally different   than that of people who don't want to know how it really is. You can come   off sounding cynical, but it isn't cynicism, really, it's just that you   have had experiences they haven't and that deeper reality becomes your   point of departure and your point of reference."
  • The contextual shift through which   our culture is moving is immense. Hackers live in the gray areas that must   exist as we redefine ourselves.
  • "The only thing the public knows   about hackers is how they defaced some Web page or crashed a server,"   Modify says. "They never hear about the hacker that e-mails an   administrator about the holes in his security or fixes security breaches   for a system administrator."
  • Sanction comes not from a central government,   however, but from the facts of paradigm change, hierarchical restructuring   and exponential change itself. The evolution of a single global economy   mandates that every business behave as if it's an independent country.   Every enterprise must manage its proprietary data and master the craft of   intelligence and disinformation. Information is currency, and those who   know how to get it and integrate it into meaningful patterns are the new   Masters of the Universe.

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