It's time to abandon the cargo cult metaphor (www.righto.com)
from tedu@inks.tedunangst.com to inks@inks.tedunangst.com on 13 Jan 19:14
https://inks.tedunangst.com/l/5163

The cargo cult metaphor is commonly used by programmers. This metaphor was popularized by Richard Feynman’s “cargo cult science” talk with a vivid description of South Seas cargo cults. However, this metaphor has three major problems. First, the pop-culture depiction of cargo cults is inaccurate and fictionalized, as I’ll show. Second, the metaphor is overused and has contradictory meanings making it a lazy insult. Finally, cargo cults are portrayed as an amusing story of native misunderstanding but the background is much darker: cargo cults are a reaction to decades of oppression of Melanesian islanders and the destruction of their culture. For these reasons, the cargo cult metaphor is best avoided.

I doubt anyone is going to avoid anything, but the history is very interesting.

#article #history #hoipolloi

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