khafra comments on Rationality Quotes October 2011 - Less Wrong
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No vote, but I've known several engineers who believe in black magic, voodoo, and/or rain dances.
Is this a reference to Agile methodologies?
Heh, it could be--but no; this is about a few educated, professional engineer friends of mine who are into pagan, asatru, ceremonial magick, and voudoun. Quite literally, black magic and voodoo (although I have yet to meet any who are well versed in native american ceremonies).
In all fairness, paganism, voudoun and magick are more like shared ceremonial practices than "religions" in a conventional sense. And these ceremonies might well have instrumental value as mind-hacking devices: "worshiping" a voudun "form" probably primes your mind towards that form's attributes (love, war etc.). This is especially useful in collective ceremonies, where it also acts as a screening/signaling device.
http://catb.org/jargon/html/B/black-magic.html
http://catb.org/jargon/html/V/voodoo-programming.html
http://catb.org/jargon/html/R/rain-dance.html