On 12/9/20 1:58 PM, Dan Cross wrote:
On Wed, Dec 9, 2020 at 12:07 PM Theodore Y. Ts'o <tytso@mit.edu> wrote:
On Wed, Dec 09, 2020 at 10:40:19AM -0500, Clem Cole wrote:
> My point is that "intelligent design" doesn't necessarily guarantee
> goodness or for that matter,complete logical thinking.

There are some really great quotes, mostly from Linus, but I saw at
least one from Larry McVoy, here, on the subject of "Linux is all
about evolution, not intelligent design" here:

https://ipfs.io/ipfs/QmdA5WkDNALetBn4iFeSepHjdLGJdxPBwZyY47ir1bZGAK/comp/evolution.html

One of the quotes from Linus that is most pertinent for TUHS from the
above:

    > There was a overall architecture, from Dennis and Ken.

    Ask them. I'll bet you five bucks they'll agree with me, not with you.

Ugh! Seriously, evolution vs design? Implying that software can result from stochastic processes (an oxymoron, if ever there was one), is unlikely. These are semantic gyrations. Unix, was designed... back of a napkin, maybe, but it didn't appear out of the primordial ooze. It came out of an ordered mind, was realized, was revised and revised again, but always guided by an ordered intellect. That said, the use of the word evolution to refer to the gradual change of something into something else over time (another semantic gyration) certainly applies and I might refer the casual reader to Ritchie's article of similar title, The Evolution of the UNIX Time-Sharing System, as a great example of this use. Other than this tenuous connection, I'd call this COFF material.

Will