Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2001 22:02:50 -0600 From: "G. Adam Stanislav" <zen@buddhist.com> To: freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: C style continued.... (Craig and Terry) Message-ID: <3.0.6.32.20010123220250.00a08790@mail85.pair.com> In-Reply-To: <xzpn1chdg9w.fsf@flood.ping.uio.no> References: <Brooks Davis's message of "Tue, 23 Jan 2001 14:41:45 -0800"> <3.0.6.32.20010123135847.009c9400@mail85.pair.com> <XFMail.010123120822.jhb@FreeBSD.org> <20010123125210.A21362@Odin.AC.HMC.Edu> <3A6E03C7.79F32AAE@netzero.net> <20010123144145.A6437@Odin.AC.HMC.Edu>
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At 00:01 24-01-2001 +0100, Dag-Erling Smorgrav wrote: >We should really found the Church of Beastie so people in such >predicaments could argue that writing GPLed code was contrary to their >religious beliefs... All kidding aside, as a serious Buddhist I *do* find GPL essentially contradicting my religious beliefs. One of our precepts is "do not take what is not given to you." Forcing anyone who makes any changes to my code to release them to me is against that precept. I can either release my software as binary only, or release it with source code under a BSD (or similar) license. But I cannot in good conscience use GPL. The Buddha also expressly prohibit his disciples from proselytizing, while GPL is full of proselytizing. I am not sure how seriously the teacher would take the claim the student belongs to the Church of Beastie (even if technically he should), but he would have no legal grounds against a student who told him he was a Buddhist and said using GPL was against his religion. I actually did once ask my Buddhist minister (who also happens to be a programmer) what he thought of Stallman. He did not recognize the name at first, but then I mentioned he was the guy who insisted all software must be free. He shook his head in disaproval, then said Stallman was naive. He also told me not to use GPL. Come to think of it, even a Christian can easily argue against GPL on religious grounds: The founder of Christianity said: "Worthy is a worker of his pay" (or something very close to that, perhaps he said "servant" rather than "worker", but the point is the same). I would not be surprised if most major religions found GPL against their basic principles if their teachers had a good understanding of the real implications of GPL. A student could discuss this with his minister, then tell the teacher with clear conscience and firm legal grounds using GPL was against his religion. At least in the US the teacher/school would have no option but let the student use a more acceptable license. Cheers, Adam To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message
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