Saturday, October 8, 2011

An unimportant person''s comment on Steve Jobs's death

Context: Everyone and his dog is hyperventilating on the internet about the death of Steve Jobs.

Here is my opinion (which like most opinions isn't worth very much, but hey this is my blog).

All men are mortal.

Steve Jobs was a man. (A great man, but still, a man.)

[Modus Ponens] Steve Jobs was mortal too.

Now he has died. The world endures. Life goes on.

Your (and my) time to depart will soon be here. The world will still endure. And life will still go on.

I read somewhere that the one regret most people have at the moment of death is about how they should have done X or Y instead of A or B.

Get back to work. Do X or Y instead of A or B. Die happy, when your time comes.

To the degree one admires Jobs, emulating his virtues in your life is a more fitting tribute than another silly comment about how he was as influential as Plato and Aristotle (an idiot actually said this on HN).

Update: on Stallman's comment on Steve Jobs' death. People have different ideas on whether a person's achievements were good or bad. This affects their judgement of whether a person's death was "good for the world" or not.

Stallman thinks that the end of Steve's influence on computing (note: he clearly distinguished it from Steve's death itself) is a good thing. And said as much.

I don't agree.

I think, for all his faults (and like you, me and every human who ever lived, he had some) Steve's influence was beneficial (overall) and I wish he'd lived longer.

But I also think it is ok for people (including Stallman) to express their opinions, even when I find them not in agreement with my own.

I look forward to the day when everyone (including me) will shut up about how other people should think exactly like everyone else.(or else we'll all get all self righteous and puffed up and hyperventilative).


And now I'll go back to coding. (Thank You for reading this far.You really should be doing something useful instead!)