[HN Gopher] Chris Seaton has died ___________________________________________________________________ Chris Seaton has died Author : iluzone Score : 386 points Date : 2022-12-07 11:20 UTC (11 hours ago) (HTM) web link (twitter.com) (TXT) w3m dump (twitter.com) | sicromoft wrote: | Tenderlove wrote a nice tribute, "In Memory of a Giant": | | http://tenderlovemaking.com/2022/12/07/in-memory-of-a-giant.... | searls wrote: | Aaron's post was incredibly touching and inspired me to share | this https://blog.testdouble.com/posts/2022-12-07-the-best- | kind-o... | noneeeed wrote: | That was lovely, and put much more eloquently how I feel | about Chris than I've managed myself. | | We really have lost an exemplar of how to be a member of a | community based on knowledge and learning. | | I hope he continues to be an inspiration to people in the | Ruby world for many years to come. | noneeeed wrote: | This bit really chimed with my brief contacts with Chris | | > As a college dropout, I've always felt underqualified. | Embarrassment about my lack of knowledge and credentials has | driven me to study hard on my own time. But Chris never once | made me feel out of place. Any time I had questions, without | judgement, he would take the time to explain things to me. | | I never once felt like he looked down on people who knew less | than him, he just saw it as an opportunity to share what he | knew with them. | | In an industry that can sometimes be dominated by arrogant | certainty, or people trying to demonstrate their brilliance, he | was a breath of fresh air. | graderjs wrote: | Seeing some of the comments here how people valued him, it seems | like maybe sometimes these sentiments of gratitude are not | expressed until after someone passes. It works if folks cherish | the time they have, and remind people of how they appreciate them | while they're still on Earth in their body. | schneems wrote: | I had lunch with him on Wednesday and wish I said more. | | I also worry about the hidden pressures of praise. A overly | critical inner life can interpret it as "I like you as long as | you are useful" which is of course not the truth. | | I have appreciation for the creators in my life, even when they | no longer create. | xtracto wrote: | >I like you as long as you are useful" which is of course not | the truth. | | I think that's the problem with depression disease: no matter | what most people tell you, your brain will find a way to use | it to dig the hole deeper. | | My wife has battled with minor depression and anxiety her | whole life. I learned that more than trying to say things to | cheer her up in the moment, i was more useful by looking for | treatment. | | It's a terrible disease. | whats_a_quasar wrote: | This is a point that is often missed in the conversation | about depression. In the middle of a major depression, | literally nothing you can say to the person will cheer them | up. The best you can do is be near them, express love, and | try to help them maintain sleep/eating/exercise and | therapy. | toyg wrote: | _> A overly critical inner life can interpret it as "I like | you as long as you are useful"_ | | That's me after most praise: "you say you like me because the | stuff I can do will help you, or because you have some | unstated aim to take advantage of me, or because you don't | know that it could have been so much better". I don't know | when, but at some point any expectation of honesty in praise | just went out of the window. Because of that, obviously, I | also don't praise people as much as I should, because I | expect they would react like I do - with obvious | repercussions on social interactions. | | The mind can be a right bitch. | schneems wrote: | I find some of the best advice for adults is found in | advice for handling small children (I've got two kids). | | The new research/trend is to try to praise behavior rather | than outcomes (or in addition). The other bit is to focus | on their actions instead of it's impact on you. For example | "I'm proud that you won that baseball game" places the | focus on me and on the outcome of winning. Versus "I saw | you really focused out there in the outfield, I know | getting distracted between bats is easy and you've come | along way." | | It's a very new way of speaking for me, but the more I | practice it the more natural it comes. My family aims to | "catch someone in praise" a few times a day. We also | celebrate celebration. I.e. if I say something nice about | someone, then they turn around and say "you get a point for | giving a point." | | > The mind can be a right bitch. | | Too true :( | rented_mule wrote: | Agreed. For many, myself included, receiving praise for | an outcome gets internalized as setting that outcome as | the minimum bar. It applies more pressure. For some, they | hear that the outcome is valuable and punish themselves | psychologically for not achieving it sooner. For some, | it's even more complicated than that. | | A few years ago, I was managing the most impactful | engineer I've ever been around (and I've seen a lot great | engineers in my 30+ year career that included stints at | several startups including my own, going through a a | pretty big IPO, working at a FAANG as it came to dominate | it's area, etc.). It was her first job and the team was | stacked with high performers. We were directly | responsible for hundreds of millions of dollars a year in | revenue. Three weeks into her career, everybody on the | team was going to her when they couldn't figure things | out. Just a phenomenal mind with a capacity for dealing | with technical complexity and finding business value that | I would have previously thought impossible. Of course | that led to a lot of praise from me and everyone else. | Every time I praised her for an outcome, she withdrew | further, eventually getting to the point that she | wouldn't say anything in one-on-ones other than short | answers to direct questions. A few months in, the CEO | (without telling any of us beforehand) used a slide from | one of her design review presentations to inspire the | company with the kinds of technical->business wins we | were now achieving as a company - it devastated her, | making her want to change careers. A month later, she | tried to reject a significant salary increase. | | Nine months in, she made (and corrected) a minor | technical mistake. I mentioned it to her in our next one- | on-one. As I did, she leaned forward and her eyes got | big. She peppered me with questions until she understood | my perspective on it from every angle. The more I spoke | about it, the more she perked up. After seeing this | response, I decided to try to find deeper "criticisms" to | bring up with her. She was so good that it was HARD to | find anything at all. Eventually I thought of what level | she'd be at in ten years and framed things as "here are | skills you have that you're not fully exploiting to be as | impactful as you could be." It instantly turned our | interactions inside out. She went from zero trust in me | as her manager to complete trust in me as a life mentor | in ~30 minutes. | | Later I asked her why that worked and she said it was one | of the few times in her life that she thought someone | understood her faults and still valued her. It's just | what you're saying about letting people know you see them | and what they're doing, not just the outcomes they are a | part of and how it affects you. I'm lucky to have learned | so much about engineering, management, and life from my | interactions with her. | | One of my heroes, Fred Rogers, was very good at this 50+ | years ago, saying things like "I like you just the way | you are." | tfigment wrote: | You are not alone. I think it goes all the way back to high | school or middle school for me. Its when you realize the | gold star stickers were behavior manipulation or something | and then see it everywhere. | layer8 wrote: | If he indeed committed suicide out of depression, I would | imagine that maybe he realized after years of relative | successes that nothing, no achievement, no | appreciation/gratitude by others, will cure his depression. At | least that wouldn't be an uncommon pattern for high-intellect | people with severe depression. | theGnuMe wrote: | This is very common actually. Phil Stutz (a famous | psychiatrist) calls it the Snapshot. Basically the Snapshot | is the misbelief that if we achieve certain things we will be | happy. It's a form of wishful thinking. Instead you have to | focus on and enjoy the journey because basic reality is pain, | uncertainty and constant work. | | There's a Netflix documentary on Stutz (called "Stutz") with | Jonah Hill that is quite good although abbreviated on its | coverage of "the tools". | entropicdrifter wrote: | As someone who suffers dysthymia and occasional major | depression on top of it, I'll never stop being grateful | that I figured this out early on in life. | | When I was 11, I got my black belt in Tae Kwon Do. A couple | years after that point I grew disillusioned with continuing | to practice martial arts altogether because I realized that | the achievement didn't make me happy. In some ways, it made | my depression worse at the time and it just took me a few | years to figure that out. | | Music has consistently sustained me since then. It's both | an endless journey of self improvement _and_ an activity | that 's possible to purely enjoy in the moment. It takes so | much of your brain at once to perform music that you | literally _cannot_ be stuck in your head with your own | thoughts, instead you reach a state of mind where there is | no ego whatsoever, just total flow-state focus and the | experience of the present. | theGnuMe wrote: | That's awesome and you've motivated me to restart piano! | nnoitra wrote: | noneeeed wrote: | Absolutely tragic news. | | I met Chris at a couple of local Ruby meetups in Bristol when he | gave talks. He was an extremely smart, but also very personable | guy. He seemed to really love what he was doing and relished the | opportunity to explain it to people and share what he knew. He | had a knack for explaining things really well in a way that never | patronised when talking to people who were not experts in his | domain. He had a real love of communicating what he knew to other | people and his passion for his projects was infectious and | inspiring. | | He was younger than me (mid 30s?), but managed to pack an immense | amount into that time. He was one of those people I've met who | I've immediately thought "I need to be more like that". Genuinely | inspirational. His death is a real loss to the community. | vips7L wrote: | This made me incredibly sad. I didn't know him, but always | enjoyed his insightful comments here on Ruby, Truffle, and the | JVM. | vidarh wrote: | I only met him once, fairly briefly, and exchanged a few messages | about our shared interest in compilers. But he seemed like a nice | guy, and it's incredibly sad to see this. | ridicthrow wrote: | Throwaway account. Not a troll comment at all. | | I wish people would stop treating suicide as a mental illness and | posting phone numbers to suicide hotlines like it's somehow wrong | and an intervention is needed. It's shallow and dismissive, and | you're no closer to understanding why people choose to take their | own lives. It is entirely devoid of "empathy" that is being | preached today as some haute virtue in people. | | When someone wants to go, let them go. There's no shame, and | hiding their actions behind shrouded veils ("has died") is | petulant behaviour. | | The man killed himself. Respect it. Don't play tonedeaf like the | "thoughts and prayers" idiots, posting phones and saying "seek | help!". It's not helping. | | PS. As someone who knows the torture that people who answer those | suicide hotlines go through, I assure you, you're left with | psychologically damaged individuals. There's not a single | individual there who is all smiles and mentally balanced after | taking those calls. There are no "professionals" in that | profession. Think about that for a moment. | swypych wrote: | It is a mental health issue, it is treatable, and it is | preventable. | | There is a lot of literature on the topic, and awareness is an | important aspect to treating this mental health issue. I never | got the sense people are shaming the person, or there is a lack | of respect. Additionally, where "thoughts and prayers" will | hardly provide any actual good (YMMV), a suicide hotline might | be the saving element for someone who may also be suffering. | djur wrote: | My experiences as a person who has been suicidal, who has been | close to suicidal people, and who has had friends who committed | suicide all tell me that it's not as simple as "wanting to | die". The same person can feel completely different about their | continued viability as a living person within the same hour. | The version of that person who wants to continue living is just | as worthy of respect. And we can only reach out to and support | the people who are still alive. | HideousKojima wrote: | >like it's somehow wrong and an intervention is needed. | | >When someone wants to go, let them go. | | Strong disagree, especially in cases where they have family and | loved ones. Children and grandchildren have a moral right to | continue seeing and enjoying time with their parents and | grandparents. Spouses have a moral right to continue enjoying | life with their beloved best friend. Outside of family I would | say there probably isn't a moral right, or at least a | significantly diminished one, but suicide takes away the | positive influence and presence that someone has on their | friends and community. | | The only part of your post that I do agree with is that we | should stop euphemizing news about suicide. I had a friend from | high school who committed suicide while serving in the army in | Iraq, and the official press release from the military made no | mention of his cause of death. He was in a non-combat role that | wouldn't have put him in any danger of getting shot or blown | up. It wasn't until a few years later when I ran into his | sister that I found out the real reason (though I had my | suspicions). | fnordpiglet wrote: | If you've never been clinically depressed and suicidal I can | understand how you feel that way. But depression is treatable, | and suicidal thoughts are generally not rational nor "typical," | even for the person experiencing them. But they feel like | ground truth at the moment. But with help that moment passes. | | There are some that it never does, and I can see an argument | there's no point in letting them suffer forever. There are some | that have rationally decided to end their life and they're not | feeling suicidal per se but are making a choice. | | But the VAST majority of the time the suicidal intention | passes, and their future self likely is glad if they got help. | | Source: I've been depressed and suicidal. I am not now and I | love life. But I remember clearly how differently I thought at | that time. | ridicthrow wrote: | > If you've never been clinically depressed and suicidal I | can understand how you feel that way. | | Not dismissive at all. | d3nj4l wrote: | A few days ago chris responded to a silly comment of mine on here | (completely unrelated to ruby or compilers), and when I saw it I | thought, "oh, it's Chris Seaton! I hope he's doing well!" | | It's so unfortunate he was not. RIP. | wpeterson wrote: | Ugh, what a loss for this community and the Ruby community. | | This should be worthy of a Hacker News black banner today. | pjmlp wrote: | What a loss, we discussed so many times about compiler related | subjects. | | My sentiments and thoughts for the family and friends. | icedchai wrote: | I didn't know him personally, but immediately recognized the name | and always enjoyed his comments here. Very sad. | adwn wrote: | Really unsettling to think that just 4 days ago, right before his | death, he was still posting here on HN. [1] | | [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=chrisseaton | orra wrote: | It's a shock, yes, but worth knowing it's a common one. | | "They can't be dead: I just spoke to them" is a common response | to death. Unfortunately, death can be rather sudden. | petercooper wrote: | I find the statistics surrounding death to be quite sobering. | I was at an annual event with 1000 other people and for | whatever reason got to wondering if everyone would return the | next year. Being a nerd, some calculations occurred and it | turned out that would be pretty much impossible as at least a | few attendees would die (of any cause) before then. It's | rather stoic but makes me appreciate things a little more. | | The Ruby community has lost some fantastic people. Chris, | Jason Seifer, Steven Bristol, Jim Weirich, James Golick, and | Ezra Zygmuntowicz all come to mind. RIP. | buffington wrote: | Losing Ezra hit me pretty hard. He was a founder at Engine | Yard, and I was a customer for many years. He landed me as | a customer because he came out and met me, and without any | sort of discussion about business or anything, he just dove | into helping architect a solution. I was sold immediately. | | Years later I worked closely with him on helping him get | his 3D printer company off the ground. Sadly though, he | died right in the middle of a very challenging time for him | and his company. | | The Ruby community has certainly lost a lot of people like | Chris and Jim (yet another selfless giant) and Ezra. | | The only consolation I can think of is how many more | selfless people are in the Ruby community still. And not | just the Ruby community, but so many communities just like | it. | | It never hurts to reach out to people, even if you think | they won't respond. If you appreciate someone, tell them. | It doesn't need to be over the top praise (unless it is | over-the-top-praise-worthy). | | It can be simple. For example, I just sent this to someone | who I was thinking about just now: "<name>, thank you for | taking the time to patiently respond to comments in the PR | I submitted. You helped clear up some confusion that I | wasn't even aware I'd introduced when describing <the | implementation of a complicated thing>. You freed up at | least a few hours of my day, which I'm really grateful | for." | jacquesm wrote: | The Ruby community also seems to attract a lot of fantastic | people. I'm not a part of it and never have been but from | the outside looking in it looks like one of the most | welcoming eco-systems out there. | CHY872 wrote: | Oh man, it was always awesome to find something from this dude! | He'll be missed. | jimnotgym wrote: | Chris often challenged me on discussions about UK politics. It is | always important to hear different viewpoints, and I will miss | that. | | He lived within an hours drive from here. Which somehow makes it | worse. This is not exactly Silicon Valley and people of his | caliber are not everywhere to talk to. | | He was pretty high up in the Army Reserve as well as his day job. | It is humbling how much some people fit into a short life. My | thoughts to his family and colleagues | lordnacho wrote: | He wrote a lot of thoughtful contributions here. Very sad to see | him go. | GrahamSeaton wrote: | As a teenage, Chris (or Kit as some in his family knew him) made | pocket-money from a programme he wrote in his bedroom in | Chandlers Ford call password safe. RIP | gozali wrote: | Gone too soon #RIPChrisSeaton | infinitedata wrote: | He basically announced his 'permanent-rest' via twitter. So sad | but grounding for all of us to remember that there are things way | more important past the marvelous inventions we can code or make. | | For learning purposes, anyone knows what was his major cause of | frustration? | Mikeb85 wrote: | > For learning purposes, anyone knows what was his major cause | of frustration? | | Suicide isn't because of frustration. Everyone has | frustrations, most don't kill themselves because of it. | OJFord wrote: | I do think it's interesting that it's so widely stigmatised | (illegal even) though: like we've collectively decided life | is meaningful and must be lived to the best of your ability, | deciding there's nothing in it for you and you don't want to | take part is not (with very niche old-age && ill-health | exception) allowed. | | Weird, when you step back and think about it isn't it? If | you're agnostic/atheist at least. | starkd wrote: | Murdering your self is still murder. There are other | victims besides the person committing it. The reason why it | is a taboo subject is because it is contagious in a way. | When the idea is broadcast at large, there is an increasing | likelihood that people on the edge will follow through. | Suicide should not be romanticized or indulged. | tasuki wrote: | You do raise valid points. | | On the other hand, Chris Seaton was apparently done with | it. I think that's his prerogative, and he handled it | gracefully. | rob74 wrote: | I guess it's the same as with the death penalty: it's a | decision that's very permanent and irrevocable. Someone may | be convinced that "there's nothing in it for them" now, but | are you really sure they would feel the same in a few | months or a few years? | WhackyIdeas wrote: | But if you have been feeling that way for many years, | with non-stop feelings of dread, it's hard to see things | getting any better. | starkd wrote: | I suspect that is very seldom the case. Depression is | cyclical. There are moments of joy and content. I think | it speaks to a loss of hope in society at large. | WhackyIdeas wrote: | There are moments of joy and content, but for myself I | always personally know that hell is just over the hill. | Doesn't mean I can't enjoy things. But I suppose there | comes a time when some people just get too tired of it | all. I also personally believe the act of taking your own | life is utterly courageous... every cell in our body's | are designed to want to live. Pushing fast fear of the | ultimate unknown is something else. And anyone out there | who says crap like "the cowards way out" is an absolute | pea brain in my eyes. | WhackyIdeas wrote: | Being downvoted for these points is a clear (and | uncomfortable for mentally healthy people to digest) | example of why depressed people often feel it's pointless | to speak and be honest about their thoughts. Because they | feel no one wants to hear them. | starkd wrote: | There is a fine line between being honest with your | thoughts and indulging in unhelpful solutions as anything | other than unhelpful. Life is not about living on the | terms you choose. You inherit the terms under which you | are to live. Rejecting those terms is indeed cowardly. | Being able to adapt is what takes courage. (And I say | this with full awareness of my own limitations as well.) | WhackyIdeas wrote: | What solutions are you referring to? I didn't give any | solutions, did I? | [deleted] | starkd wrote: | Proposing suicide as a solution. It is quite cowardly, | because you are rejecting the terms life handed you. | Courage is persisting through to finding a way of living | on those terms. | WhackyIdeas wrote: | In absolutely no way on earth did I propose suicide as a | solution - what vile nonsense. Maybe read something | properly before throwing a damaging allegation like that. | Pfft. I'm done commenting any more on this topic with | you. | starkd wrote: | Not you specifically. I'm sorry if that was the | impression. | wnolens wrote: | Calling someone a coward is insulting regardless. Let's | not put that label on folks near the edge - you have no | idea what they dealing with. It might bring you to your | knees far earlier. | WhackyIdeas wrote: | Absolutely 100%. We hear it all the time though. And | imagine how hurtful it is for families and friends to | hear that drivel about a loved one. Makes my blood boil. | starkd wrote: | It's not about putting a label on anyone. It's about | making sure it doesn't inadvertently become a model for | others. No counselor or friend is going to be there when | they are alone and make the decision. | marcinzm wrote: | To some people simply living for some time requires more | courage than any reasonable person would muster in a | lifetime. Reprimanding them for not having even more | courage seems a sad thing to say. | brigandish wrote: | Lack of hope is the real killer, that's why it's so | important to give a depressed person hope. Not optimism, | hope. | WhackyIdeas wrote: | You can't give a depressed person hope though. And even | if you could box hope up, how would you make it last? At | the end of the day, depression is a chemical imbalance | and hope isn't going realistically fix that - maybe that | depression is a result of brain injury, like a nasty bump | on the head that has permanently damaged the way the | brain works... Depression is a long way off being solved. | OJFord wrote: | Even that suggests that living life is some kind of | 'default' or 'obviously correct' state, that anything | else has to supply sufficient reason to deviate from. Why | should that be so, really? Just because we are born into | it? | | To be pithy: why must death justify itself, but not life? | tasuki wrote: | > Not optimism, hope. | | What is the difference? | Mikeb85 wrote: | Optimism is trying to convince yourself things are better | than they are, hope is the idea that things can actually | get better. | Lio wrote: | I would speculate that the societal stigmatisation of | suicide is a form of social "guard-rails" that might keep | someone from stepping to far in the wrong direction during | a moment of weakness. | | It might be the last thing that saves them when they are | not in their right mind and have lost all hope and | perspective. In that moment anything that can be done to | protect them should be done because there is always hope, | even if you can't see it right now. | | Things do change. | themaninthedark wrote: | One of the things I often hear said about people who | attempt suicide but fail by jumping is that they have a | moment of clarity on the way down that their problems are | not a big deal and are solvable except the current one of | imminent death. | | Not sure if this is true in all cases and what the | outcome for these people is after time passes, do they | still feel depressed or are things better for them. | | But, if that is the general experience, then it makes | sense for society to stigmatize the action. | SoftTalker wrote: | I wouldn't say I agree but can understand the point of | view. | | I think a lot of people would feel differently about | someone who takes his own life because of a terminal | illness such as cancer, where it's seen as a way to end up | in the same place while avoiding a lot of pain and | suffering. "Death with dignity." So why don't we feel the | same way about someone with painful, debilitating | depression? We don't really understand how to cure | depression. We have some drugs that help some people, | analagous to what narcotics do for people in physical pain. | But we don't understand how to cure depression, as we don't | understand how to cure cancer. Maybe someday we will, but | what does that do for the people suffering today, who just | want a way out? | throw10920 wrote: | This comment exemplifies a pattern of rather useless comments | that I've seen a lot of online recently, that are analogous | to "contradiction - stating the opposing case with little or | no evidence" on the argument pyramid: when a commentator X | states a thing, commentator Y states that that thing isn't | true, with no supporting evidence, but more importantly no | additional value or elaboration added - just saying "that's | wrong" without explaining why, or saying what is actually the | case. | | For instance, here, value would be added by stating what | _are_ the actual causes of suicide - or even adding research | that supports your point even if you don 't want to talk | about what the actual causes are. | Mikeb85 wrote: | Fair enough, but most people do know the _actual_ cause... | Namely mental illness or depression. | dctoedt wrote: | And sadly, we know _so ... freaking ... little_ about how | the brain works. | vintermann wrote: | Frustration is just a word. It's maybe not the optimal word | for it, but we understand what's meant: the situations on the | inside and outside that made him consider such a choice. | | Keep in mind many people on HN (incl. me) don't even speak | English as a first language. | tuyiown wrote: | Suicide is very personal, should be treated as an extremely | complex issue that its uniqueness for each cannot be expressed | in details correct enough to respect the regretted. | | I know you just want to know if any major points could stand | out to bring some understanding, and they are probably some, | but it's important to treat it as a might be relavant, but | always small, piece of a the vastness of one's mind can be. | freedomben wrote: | I would have agreed fully with you for most of my life, but | having now lost half a dozen friends to suicide, I think | we're making a big mistake by not talking about it honestly | and openly. Not only is it much harder for the friends/loved | ones who are left in the dark about what happened, but it | misses opportunities for learning and understanding. Most | people who have never been ready to kill themselves have no | idea what it's like, the hopelessness, the weariness, and | worst of all the lies your mind tells you. | | I do insist on being classy and respectful, particularly for | the family members, but I wish as a society we would talk | openly and honestly about these issues instead of high | opacity implications. | wnolens wrote: | Shit, half a dozen? I'm so sorry. Were you able to learn | anything about their internal state prior? | theGnuMe wrote: | >Suicide is very personal, should be treated as an extremely | complex issue that its uniqueness for each cannot be | expressed in details correct enough to respect the regretted. | | Can you elaborate on what you mean here? Are you saying that | every suicide is unique and out of respect for the dead we | should not try to understand it? | ngd wrote: | When I was 15 I had to move high school after the death of my | mother. I started to socialise at school and joined the | investment club. It was a tough time for me and I desperately | wanted to make friends and fit in. I wasn't really into investing | but a young man by the name of Chris Seaton was building their | website and I loved computers so I wanted to help. Chris taught | me how to program, first HTML websites, then PHP based apps, then | C# and VBA native apps. Im pretty sure Chris invented the | password manager before it was a thing too. | | I spent the next few years at high school and sixth form trying | to sit near Chris in lessons and talking to him on MSN Messenger | and ICQ incessantly about programming, he taught me a lot and set | me on a path to choosing computer science as my degree, I just | copied him to be honest. | | I'll miss you Chris | djur wrote: | Thanks for sharing this. Please take care of yourself. There's | something uniquely painful about losing someone who you look up | to as a mentor. | aphrax wrote: | This a beautiful thing to share. I wish I'd known him and I'm | sorry for your loss. | GrahamSeaton wrote: | As a teenager, Chris (or Kit as some of his family knew him) | wrote a computer programme, in his bedroom in Chandlers Ford, | he called Password Safe. RIP Kit | MaxBarraclough wrote: | He'll be missed. I didn't know him, but learnt something every | time our paths met here. | ilrwbwrkhv wrote: | If you have a lower baseline of happiness, please do yourself a | favour and read Albert Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus. | | It starts with: | | There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is | suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts | to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. All the | rest-- whether or not the world has three dimensions, whether the | mind has nine or twelve categories--comes afterwards. These are | games; one must first answer. | | Absurdism is a great way to live life and understand that nothing | is worth killing yourself for. | ksec wrote: | About 10 years ago he started a project with Ruby running on | Graal before it was known as TruffleRuby. I still remember those | HN submissions. SubstrateVM, Graal, The VM to rule it all. And as | far as I am aware, he was the only one putting all papers about | Ruby and Compilers Design in a single place [1]. | | I still remember a thread which I have bookmarked somewhere, | where you have the lead of JVM, Graal, TruffleRuby, JSC, V8 and | Spidermonkey along with another compiler expert arguing ( or in a | heated debate ) about Dynamic languages. And when ever you have | compiler related submission on HN, you will see him contribute | his expertise on the subject. | | He has been a valuable member of the Ruby and HN Community. I | once joked "I am a simple man, I see Chris Seaton, I Upvote :)." | I still remember I felt honoured when he followed me on Twitter. | | He will surely be missed by many. | | R.I.P | | [1] https://rubybib.org | freedomben wrote: | As a fellow Rubyist and HN reader I know what you mean! There | was always something mindblowing from Chris in the thread, | usually multiple things. There's a big hole in my heart today. | leetrout wrote: | Please talk to someone if you are feeling hopeless. | | U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 800-273-TALK (8255) | | National Suicide Helpline UK 0800 689 5652 | | His HN profile was also just his name | https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=chrisseaton | | I wish the best for his family and friends over the next few | months. This will be a tough holiday season for them. | | You never know what is going on in someone's life and no clue | what was going on in his but I think working in tech is harder | than people recognize / give credit (and may not have any bearing | on Chris, I am not trying to speculate). | | Please talk to someone if you are feeling hopeless. | | U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline 800-273-TALK (8255) | | National Suicide Helpline UK 0800 689 5652 | zwaps wrote: | If you are struggling with self-worth, please read very | carefully the posts of people who actually knew Chris Seaton. | People value him by how much of himself and his time he was | willing to give to others, not by some absolute measure of his | skill. This is a capacity everyone has. | | In fact, you probably have touched someone (if unknowingly) in | a similar manner. People who decide to go, very very often | leave behind a heart shattered to pieces - unknowingly. | noneeeed wrote: | In the UK the Samaritans how have a short number 116 123. | adamc wrote: | Having been on the other end of it... the reality is harsh. | People say they want to know, but in fact... they mostly don't. | The reality of it is hard to deal with. It can go on and on. | | People have a lot of misconceptions, sometimes for good reasons | (it makes life easier to endure). It's a lot like the pushback | on #metoo or #blacklivesmatter or <almost anything linked to | traumatic experience>. They want to make it your fault because | then its not something they have to think about. | | I think depression is mostly orthogonal to where you work, | although stress may make it worse. | silisili wrote: | I agree with this. Someone reaching out because they have a | problem or need someone to talk to is perfectly welcomed. | Someone who does so daily becomes a big f'ing drag on your | life, pardon the expression. | | My father did that to us kids after divorce, and our | relationship has never been the same. | | (For those curious, he didn't hurt himself, just became an | angry, sad, drunk yearslong drag on us all). | Jensson wrote: | silisili wrote: | I'd have preferred he not leave drunken angry voicemails | every time I didn't answer the phone, and sought | professional help. Which he did, eventually, but after 2 | years of verbal abuse and telling us we were dead to him. | Jensson wrote: | adamc wrote: | As someone who's been through depression and has an | estranged son (for reasons that were never even | articulated)... being angry doesn't help. Their choices | may be no more free than our own. | | Sometimes the universe gives us tough choices. | Jensson wrote: | Depressed people often do a lot of things they later | regret. Doesn't mean they could have done it any other | way, just that would prefer to not have done it. | | > Sometimes the universe gives us tough choices. | | Yeah, like accepting when an asshole reaches out or | letting him kill himself. I don't think it is wrong to | try to reach out when you are too mentally unstable to be | nice to people, in fact that is probably the time when | you should reach out the most because you are very likely | to kill yourself then because that anger can easily turn | inwards. But there really are no perfect ways to handle | that, the best solution is to never get that bad to begin | with but when you are there you can't really get out of | it without burning something. | whats_a_quasar wrote: | This was definitely my experience. It takes so long and so | much effort to get out of a deep depression that it strains | everyone around you. | | If anyone's gone through or is going through something | similar, I highly recommend "The Noonday Demon." It captures | much of the subjective experience of someone going through a | depression, and how weird and frustrating the experience can | be for everyone involved. https://www.amazon.com/Noonday- | Demon-Atlas-Depression/dp/150... | altendo wrote: | In the US, dialing 988 will also get you access to the National | Suicide Prevention Lifeline. (Technically it is now the 988 | Lifeline, but they both refer to the same thing[1].) | | 1: https://988lifeline.org/current-events/the-lifeline-and-988/ | toomuchtodo wrote: | You can also dial or text 988 in the US. | | https://988lifeline.org/ | naedish wrote: | Support services for other countries below. | | https://meta.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/Mental_health_resources | [deleted] | jacquesm wrote: | Gah that so sucks. He left behind a wife and young daughter. Such | a nice man, this really is painful. | gavinray wrote: | What terrible news to wake up to. | | I hate when they say "passed away" -- here was a man in his | prime, just the other week sharing knowledge of compilers at a | conference, taken from the world. | | Chris helped me frequently on the GraalVM slack, and it was nice | to see his face in the comments of many of the threads here on HN | that had to do with compilers and compiler optimizations. I will | miss him. | foobazgt wrote: | I wasn't privileged to know Chris personally, but I was always | keenly waiting to hear his latest achievements and insights. He | was clearly talented, passionate, and compassionate. It is so | very sad to see him go. | | Depression is a full blown pandemic. For example, in the US in | 2021, there were approximately as many suicide attempts as there | were COVID deaths. It is so fucked up and so pernicious. | | We (rightfully) encourage folks to seek help, but the very nature | of the illness makes it difficult for them. Let's all also do our | best to recognize the signs of folks struggling so that we can be | there for them - to help them recover when it's so hard for them | to even reach out for help. | nazgulsenpai wrote: | His personal website for those, like me, who didn't know the | name. | | https://chrisseaton.com/ | | Even without knowing of him, this is incredibly tragic and my | condolences to all of those affected. | tiffanyh wrote: | Internet Archive. | | Does anyone know how to recursively save his entire website to | Wayback Machine? | | I submitted https://chrisseaton.com, but it doesn't appear any of | the child pages are being archived. | nirvdrum wrote: | If it helps any, Chris's web site used GitHub Pages and its | source is available at | https://github.com/chrisseaton/chrisseaton.github.io. | eatonphil wrote: | There's no particular guarantee that this will stick around | either as Github/MS changes policies down the line. Some | guaranteed long-term archive like archive.org would be | better. | nirvdrum wrote: | Right. I don't know if that GitHub account will be around | forever, but you can clone it now and build the site. If it | came to it, we could host on another domain. I'm just | suggesting that we don't need to worry about archive.org | getting every last bit of content. | toomuchtodo wrote: | Done. Will take some time for any straggler pages to show up in | the CDX indexes. | mossity wrote: | It looks pretty well archived to me, where are you seeing | things missing? | Edd314159 wrote: | It's not implausible that many of us who work with Ruby owe our | livelihoods to Chris, and his relentless efforts to progress the | language and not just keep it relevant, but thriving. He will be | missed so much by the community. | aardvark179 wrote: | I worked with him on TruffleRuby for almost six years, and knew | him for a few years before that. I think every one who knew him | is shocked and saddened by this news. | kshahkshah wrote: | I'm sorry for your loss then. We followed each other on Twitter | and I tried to plug the TruffleRuby and Graal work wherever I | could as I really believed it is the future of Ruby. Beyond | that what a brilliant writer. This single article helped me | understand so much more about a language I've cherished for | nearly two decades: | https://chrisseaton.com/truffleruby/deoptimizing/ | kshahkshah wrote: | My god this is awful. He was brilliant, accomplished, and kind. A | few days ago he announced his 'permanent rest' | (https://twitter.com/ChrisGSeaton/status/1599108759183577088). | I'd thought it meant from the Ruby community and that the replies | asking if he needed help were reading too much into the wording. | [deleted] | swader999 wrote: | The outpouring of love in the replies on that thread. It is | tough to comprehend how that wasn't enough to prevent this. | bluerooibos wrote: | Yeah. The guy had what appears to be a pretty great life. | Looking through twitter, there's photos of him with his kids | and wife. | | I just can't comprehend how someone can arrive at the | decision to commit suicide, especially when you have a wife | and children, and to then tweet about it. The human mind is | an odd thing. | paufernandez wrote: | The depressed sees the same events quite differently, that's | why it is so difficult to understand for many people (I can | though). | freedomben wrote: | Indeed. The human mind is wildly talented at lying to us in | sometimes sinister ways. | | It's hard to imagine if you haven't been there, but in the | moment you are seriously thinking about it, your mind can | truly convince you that your | family/spouse/kids/friends/work/church/etc will all be | better off without you, even though that is virtually never | true. Don't trust your mind when it tells you things like | that. | swader999 wrote: | Right, I've read that for them its not even seen as making | a choice. Earth is too freaking hard sometimes. | sasattack wrote: | It's not a choice. It's not seen as a choice. The Choice | is not between life-and-death but between suffering and | ending your suffering. This is how the suicidal mind | thinks. When suffering becomes greater than any other | emotion it It's like a pressure that has to be relieved | djur wrote: | When I've been in that place, other people's kindness can | feel like evidence that I'm hurting them -- that I'm | drawing energy from them, that I'm a hole in the world that | needs to be repaired but can't, that kind of thing. (That | isn't to say that such displays of appreciation and love | can't also be helpful and welcomed.) | munificent wrote: | Like many mental illnesses, depression interferes with your | perceptions. It's not that that love "wasn't enough", it's | that a person deep in depression can't even accurately see or | feel that love. | swader999 wrote: | Yeah and it is especially hard for high achievers to ask | for help or even consider that they should ask for help. I | think its completely foreign to them. | philosopher1234 wrote: | Depression might not even really be about love. Seems like | aggression plays a big role in it too. | kunalgupta wrote: | Oh no. I read the initially and thought it was about twitter. | :( rest in peace. | HL33tibCe7 wrote: | Desperately sad news. I never met him, he never met Me, but | https://chrisseaton.com/army/ made a real impression on me. It's | the kind of thing that sits in your head and pops up from time to | time. I found the level of dedication here alongside his | professional success incredibly inspiring. Tragically, part of | that article is about his young daughter. | | Not really sure what to think now. | bostonwalker wrote: | Like you his article about the army reserve made an impression | on me. I myself am a serving officer in the Canadian Army | reserve and I reached out to him to connect. He was generous | with his time and we were chatting about work, life, and army | stuff this year. He offered help in finding me a role within | Shopify and most recently he congratulated me on finishing my | junior officer training. | | Chris was not just a great technologist but also an officer and | a gentleman. Rest in peace, Sir. | pwdisswordfish9 wrote: | This part had something about it that stuck out in light of the | news (first just a bit, but then it kept going): | | "My fantastic job with Shopify meets my physiological and | safety needs, and the job is rewarding and intellectually | stimulating (not many people get to work on their PhD work for | so long with a team they've built around them and I'm very | grateful.) But then what? What are you doing to feel alive and | to know that you matter? How do you fit into something enduring | and bigger than yourself? The Army challenges me every week, | and those challenges better me and make me happier. I know that | people are depending on me, and that if I don't turn up and | lead my Squadron then nobody's going to do that for me." | | Like you, not sure what to think. | wnolens wrote: | Indeed, he seemed to have all the things that generally is | believed to combat that trend towards darkness. | | However, I recall my absolute lowest and the first time I | entertained the thought to end it, the 'it' was specifically | what it felt like to be in my body. It wasn't a matter of | self-worth, it was to stop pain. The strongest reason I could | come up with to wait for it to pass was the pain it would | cause my mother. | | So, I don't know. | sbuccini wrote: | This cuts deep. Chris had a big impact on my current life | trajectory, one that is still playing out -- which is why I was | holding off on reaching out with an update. Now I'll never get | that chance. | | Chris seemed to be _everywhere_ and was always generous with his | time, even to complete newbies like myself. He certainly set the | standard, as one would expect from an Army officer. I'm not | exactly sure what his experiences were like in active duty, but | we lose way too many vets to mental health issues. If you know a | veteran, consider checking in -- this time of year is | particularly tough. | cinntaile wrote: | https://twitter.com/ChrisGSeaton/status/1599108759183577088 | | I didn't know him but recognized the name from HN. | ehPReth wrote: | I saw this tweet just randomly in the AI timeline and brushed | it off as him just being busy/done/taking a break from open | source ruby work.. maybe moving on to something else or just | picking a different hobby. Quite a shock to see this today | freedomben wrote: | everybody did. it's horrifying now, but people as smart as | Chris that are going to do it, are going to do it. They know | that tipping the hand too early will result in forced | prevention (something we as a society have messed up about | but that's a separate post). He worded it that way on | purpose. In my opinion as a kindness so he could say goodbye | rather than just disappearing without a sound. | docdeek wrote: | The tweet seems to imply this was not an unexpected death on | his part. Was he unwell? | djmips wrote: | A form of a suicide note possibly. I hope I'm not reading it | wrong but that's what I took from his post especially in | context of his sudden passing. | bluerooibos wrote: | I saw photos of him presenting at the Ruby conference just a | week ago and he looks pretty healthy. | yla92 wrote: | I saw this tweet and I was wondering about the language used | there like "permanent rest" but was thinking he was going to | delete his Twitter account. Will miss seeing his comments on HN | and his contributions. RIP, Chris. ___________________________________________________________________ (page generated 2022-12-07 23:00 UTC)