HN Explorer

Was Leonardo DaVinci a Hacker?

7 points by goodlab ↗ HN
Was Leonardo a hacker? Obviously there as no code back then. And today the term hacker is connected to code/programmers. So I guess the questions is really "Can a non-programmer can be a hacker?"

To me it seems to be more about the spirit of invention, willingness to work at something when your not sure of the outcome. Perhaps a hacker is just an inventor in the digital age.

If that's true then I am definitely a hacker. If not, and if hacker must write code then... sadly, I am not a hacker, at least not a very good one. But if being hacker is about invention then I am a super hacker! While I am able to code html/css/js at a novice level my abilities are really about invention. So I wonder and ask everyone: Can a non programmer be a hacker?

4 comments

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wazoox
As a tinkerer, thinker and universally curious mind, he definitely was a hacker, like Archimedes centuries before, and Daedalus in the mist of time; like that guy who for the first time made a tool from a couple of stones by hitting them together, even farther away from us.
lyllo
That is a good question. If a non-programmer can be a hacker that takes me back to the first of our ancestors who hacked his body and stood up to give us our first huge breakthrough: bipedality. Said that, I think Leonardo DaVinci was a Mitnick of his age.
mahmud
He is the archetype.
MrBlueSky
Of course he is a hacker if you redefine hacker like that. This is just a semantical question.

2+2 also equals 5 if you redefine the symbol 2 to stand for 2.5.