Hello, World!
...or welcome back! I’ve been silent for the last 7 years and now I’m trying to resurface with this new blog :-)
Some of you might remember my previous work on Qubes OS1, a paranoid-security OS, which I started back in 2009, and led its development for the next 9 years. Others might have been readers of my previous blog2, written in the period of 2006-2018, focusing on computer systems security (and insecurity), and specifically on operating systems and virtualization security. Very technical staff, in other words ;) So technical, in fact, that it was easy for me to lose touch with some other aspects of life.
During my long life as a computer security researcher and architect, I’ve been primarily motivated by the pursuit of Truth (aka Knowledge) as the supreme Value. And Freedom. Other transcendentals3, those typically associated with Humanism, I tended to consider to be of a somewhat lesser value.
These days, in my mid-forties, my value system is a bit more complex ;)
This blog is intended to be a reportage of my struggles between Rationality and Humanism. Pragmatism and Beauty. Formalism and Intuition. Freedom and Love. Individualism, Independence and Privacy on the one side, vs Egalitarianism, Sharing and Community on the other.
I wish my younger self could have read what I plan to write here. My life might have been more fulfilling, I think.
The above statement might have suggested I’ve already found all the answers to human happiness and now will mercifully broadcast them to the world. I wish... Actually, no, I don’t! Because I suspect this might be self-defeating, in fact. For it seems that the struggle, the uncertainty, the incompleteness, they all might be the central theme of humanism, perhaps even its very essence.
If you would like to get in touch with me, e.g. to share your perspective, or point out flaws in my reasoning (humanist or not, I still believe rational thinking has its place in any discourse) -- please check the About section for information on how to do so.
Member discussion