Conference thebay::joyoflex

    Hate to inform you, but according to Dante, the last circle of Hell
    IS frozen over.  So your observation about the weather could mean
    that you are in Hell now.
    
    Clay

    
    Hmmm, 
    
    We'd then have to consider "a snowball's chance in hell".
    Sounds like certainty to me.
    jc    

    Does anybody know how the concepts of hell/heaven and heat/cold
    became randomly shuffled throughout various stories?
    
    For example, today's "common knowledge" is that hell is firey hot
    but heaven is perpetually pleasant (sorta like Southern California ;-).
    But wasn't Elysian supposed to be a perfect flame that purifies?
    
    Perhaps the selection of hot/cold depended on the person's birth
    place.  After becoming accustomed to Mediterrean warmth, the
    possibility of being frozen might scare more people back to the
    straight-and-narrow.

>    For example, today's "common knowledge" is that hell is firey hot...

And yet, we say "it's cold as hell out there."

    
    re: .0, a bug-free program would be written, never to have
    	    the source code changed again.
    
    	    might this have something to do with superconductivity?

    re .3
    
    There is some true to the notion that the concept of hell depends
    on your point of origin.  The people of the Himalayas consider
    hell to be very cold.
    
    Personally, I have no notion about whether hell is hot or cold,
    but I am positive that it is HUMID!
    
    Dave

     There used to be a line of greeting cards that featured
     newspaper style pictures and headlines on the front with
     a witty follow-up inside.  One of them had on the front a
     photo of a deserted, frozen wasteland with the headline
     HELL FREEZES OVER!  On the inside it said ...
     
          I was expecting to hear from you right about now.
     
     Dan

    	I used to work with someone who maintained that a bug was disorder
    in a programme, and therefore entropy. A first consequence of this is
    that a bug must have mass, and so you can tell the number of bugs in a
    programme by comparing its weight with a bug-free programme.
    
    	A second consequence is that at absolute zero all programmes would
    be bug-free.

    If hell has frozen over, that will explain the flying pigs I can
    see out of the window, and the fact that I had a peaceful day at
    work!
    
        
    ..klaas..
    
        

    re: -1
         If you are seeing pigs outside your window, it could be
         that you have been listening to too much Pink Floyd.... :-)
    

    Re .10:
    
    Oh, it's easy to see pigs outside your window.  The rarity is _flying_
    pigs. 
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    re .10
    
    I guess I had a "momentary lapse of reason", probably because of
    all the "animals" that live on the "dark side of the moon".
    
    ..klaas..
    

    Re .12 (Klaas),
    
    	A nice pair of animals were they?  Or just relics?  Make the
    final cut and come out from behind that wall of yours because, 
    really, we wish you were here.
    
    
    Ian.

    	Far be it from a moderator to meddle in a topic as obscured by
    clouds as this.

Hey, don't spend time or money on that group anymore.
Just be careful with the relics of that axe...

Arie

    
    Having started this minor rathole, I guess I'd better get back to
    the topic.......
    
    If hell HAS frozen over, the I'd better get ready for my date with
    the gorgeous lady I met down at the health club.......
    
    ..klaas..
    

         � If you are seeing pigs outside your window, it could be
         � that you have been listening to too much Pink Floyd.... 
    
    	Or reading too much Lewis Carroll...
    
    					andrew
    

    Re: .8
    
    Does this imply that a bug-free program is massless?  If so, it
    will depart instantly at the speed of light.
    
    Therefore, bugs are useful to keep our programs around.
    
    	- Win
    

    Starting yet another digression (that relates to two previous ones...sort
    of), has anyone developed a pantheon of gods and spirits that relate
    to programming activities? 
    
    I have always thought that there should be some gods and spirits to
    whom we could make offerings of burnt listings to protect our software 
    from bugs. Any ideas?

    	We already have the basis for a dualist theology - those who
    believe bug-free programmes are possible, and those who belive that it
    is only the bugs that keep programmes within the solar system and
    therefore knowable.
    
    	May all you bugs be features...

    I always thought Murphy was the programmers' patron....
    
    -dave

    Re "bug" patron:
    
    In Norse mythology, Loki (not the Marvel Comics version of same)
    would be appropriate.
    
    So would Eris, goddess of Discord.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    	Other mythical quality degraders were Kobolds. These creatures
    inhabited mines, particularly iron mines, and apart from playing other
    tricks they would ensure that the steel produced was poor quality.
    
    	These days the poor quality is generally attributed to an excess of
    cobalt, not of Kobolds, and modern chemistry can not only solve the
    problem but find practical uses for the cobalt extracted.
    
    	Maybe in a hundred years people will be saying a similar thing for
    computer science and bugs.
    
    		2089 News Flash.
    		----------------
    	"Modern bugge recycling facility built in Maynard. Now all bugges
    are automatically extracted from carelessly written code and inserted
    in passing worms and viruses to ensure their early demise".

    Re .23:
    
    >	Other mythical quality degraders were Kobolds. These creatures
    >inhabited mines, particularly iron mines, and apart from playing other
    >tricks they would ensure that the steel produced was poor quality.
    >
    >	These days the poor quality is generally attributed to an excess of
    >cobalt, not of Kobolds ...
     
    If it isn't perfecvtly clear, the metal Cobalt was names after the
    Kobolds.  Kobolds were rather nasty little underground dwellers,
    slightly worse than the "Knockers" of the English mines.  Kobolds
    and Knockers might cause harm to miners, especially if there were
    only one or two at a spot underground.  The miners would hear knocking 
    sounds from the mine tunnels, coming out of the darkness, and know
    that the Kobolds were coming to get them ....
    
    It's unclear, but mythologically, the Kobolds appear to have some
    relationship to the Earth-elementals called Gnomes (no relation
    to the garden-decoration variety).  Oh, well, start a mine, and
    there goes the neighborhood.
    
    Steve Kallis, Jr.

    	I had heard of the Kobold -> cobalt derivation many years ago, so
    I checked it in my Oxford dictionary before I entered the note.
    
    	Maybe we need a note on obscure, unlikely or impossible
    derivations.

    Isaac Asimov wrote a book entitled "Words of Science", wherein he
    traces the origins of common and uncommon scientific words.  The
    paths that a word takes from its original meaning to its current
    use are sometimes torturous, and very often fascinating.
                                              
    F'rinstance: alcohol derives from an Arabic phrase that translates
    roughly as "the mascara."           
    		 			andrew

    When missionaries described hell as fire and brimstone, the
    Eskimos used to get far-away gleams in their eyes.  The missionaries
    had to obtain special political permission in order to describle
    hell as a frozen wasteland.

    If I recall correctly, Dante's hell had many levels (nine?). Which one
    you were committed to depended on your sins in life. Some of the levels
    had fire and brimstone.  The bottom one, where the devil himself was
    located, was ice. The devil was frozen up to his nose in the ice.  When
    his nose ran ....  The descriptions are all very graphic, and might
    very well deter believers.