The real meaning of Lorem ipsum text. How this text represents the philosophy coders live by?

The mother of all gibberish text and insignificant part of coding; Lorem ipsum text has such an ironic existence that its sole purpose is to be replaced by another content as soon as possible. And it is the internet's most popular placeholder text. But unbeknownst to the common eye, the real value of this text lies in its philosophical teachings.

Contrary to popular belief, Lorem ipsum isn't a senseless text; it has roots in a piece of classical Latin literature from 45 BC. These are paragraphs from a philosophical work with five series called "On the Extremes of Good and Evil"- by a Roman lawyer, statesmen, and philosopher, Marcus Tullius Cicero. To be more specific, it is derived from the first book of that work and it’s a discussion of hedonism. And this literary piece carries the expounding and criticism of the greatest ancient philosophies: Epicureanism.

Why this text and not any other?

The use of this as dummy text long precedes the digital age. It had already been popular in the printing business as early as the 1500s. It is theorized that a typesetter(A typesetter is responsible for choosing margin size, fonts, chapter styles, how large section breaks are, where illustrations go, what size subheadings are, and so on.), who was required to make a type specimen book, using the text as a way to demonstrate different fonts. And since the text should be insensible; not to distract from the graphical features, the typesetter scrambled the words. 

Since the works of Cicero were most prevalent at that time, the typesetter found this text closer than any other. So it was a happy coincidence that he used these texts.

And from that day on, this has been popularized by different companies. It was also revived in different time intervals to be used as a dummy text.

But what does Lorem Ipsum mean?

The Lorem Ipsum we know today isn't accurate; some of its words had been altered, added and removed to make it nonsensical and improper Latin. 

The passage "Lorem ipsum ..." is taken from the text that reads,"

qui dolorem ipsum, quia dolor sit amet consectetur adipisci velit, sed quia non numquam eius modi tempora incidunt, ut labore et dolore magnam aliquam quaerat voluptatem

", which translates as,"

Nor again is there anyone who loves or pursues or desires to obtain pain of itself, because it is pain, but occasionally circumstances occur in which toil and pain can procure him some great pleasure.

" 

And I believe this, unintentionally, depicts the philosophy programmers and coders live by. 

The epicurean attitude of programmers

Epicureanism is a system of ancient philosophy based upon the teachings of the ancient Greek philosopher Epicurus. Epicureans consider pleasure to be the chief good in life. But Emphasis was placed on pleasures of the mind rather than on physical pleasures. And Unnecessary and, especially, artificially produced desires were to be suppressed

Spending countless hours in front of the screen, dangling on a single problem for the whole day, and finding pleasure in solving the codes; a programmer's life is rather a simple one. He doesn't take a better interest in outside matters, nor in political issues, nor news, and has no idea of world events; all he understands is the lines of code in front of him.

They don't overindulge in vain. Sitting at a single spot, straining one's eyes and hands; they aren't physically enjoying it. But they discover purpose and mental peace with the process of coding itself.

It's not like they are monks who are free from emotions and materialistic pleasure. They are normal humans but their perseverance is Sagelike. When they fail to solve the code, they become agitated. And after hours of searching, they see they had missed a semicolon. For normal people, such frustration would make them put bicycle spokes in their eyes, but for coders, it is just a normal day. 

But no matter what happens during the light, nothing blisses their heart than spending the evening with other fellow coders. With drinks in their hands and having conversations about human existence, they find relief from all the frustration.

Programmers are modern philosophers. They are better at realizing that a specific problem is a case to a more general problem. Thus they see events in terms of the bigger picture. They are systematic as well as critical thinkers. They identify and rigorously define what problems they are trying to tackle. So they draw insight from the whole picture and apply it to the specific problem at hand. This method of problem-solving makes their solutions most efficient as well as effective.

Even after tackling so much failure, a programmer is still a humble being. No matter how excellent his skill sets are, he admits his weakness: His code isn’t gonna work on the first try. He understands that he makes frequent mistakes but it is the process of iterative improvement that counts. The painful feeling of failing but the inspiration of getting up again is the new norm for him. This fortifies his mindset against temporary setbacks and makes him more comfortable with the failures of his own life.

Once any person becomes a programmer, they will soon realize a few important life lessons: pain is the process of growing up, failure is a teacher, not an end and each failed code gives new insights such that it strengthens his imagination.

Who would have thought that a gibberish text like Lorem Ipsum could hold so much insight about a programmer? Since there is no historical evidence, we can assume that It was a mere coincidence that Lorem Ipsum became the standard placeholder text. But I still feel this coincidence was a very peculiar one. It is just a fun thought but perhaps it was fate itself that tied the strings for these two entities.