Naming is power

Many cultural and religious traditions place a lot of importance in names, and hold that names have power. There is something magical about them.

In Classical Greek tradition, Hades was feared and his name was not spoken. The Bible supposes that the name of God is to be used for swearing oaths, which should not be done lightly. Islam recognises 99 names for God, each describing an aspect. Or in folklore, take the story of Rumplestiltskin, a creature that is defeated only by discovering and speaking his name. Chinese culture places plenty of importance on names, with various traditions and taboos around them. Individuals often have several names depending on the context and their relationships with the users of each name. Sun Yat-sen was a particularly notable example.

I like naming things. Names make it possible to refer to something. Good names make it possible to refer to something unambiguously. Even better names allow you to not only refer to something, but also to place it within a bigger context.

Naming things is a creative act, in both senses of the word creative — both that it requires creativity, and that giving something a name is a fundamental step in the process of bringing something into being. It is often the first thing that new parents do for their children, perhaps even before they are born.

The Book of Genesis describes the power to name things as being exclusively given to human beings:

So out of the ground the Lord God formed every animal of the field and every bird of the air and brought them to the man to see what he would call them, and whatever the man called every living creature, that was its name. The man gave names to all cattle and to the birds of the air and to every animal of the field [...]

...alongside humanity's mastery over, and responsibility for, the world.

Anyway, I recently had the pleasure of commissioning a number of new computers for a new lab network, and as part of that, was tasked with coming up with names for these machines. I don't know where I'm going with this anecdote, I just enjoyed the episode and it was a fun exercise that felt good.

RFC 1178 has some specific guidelines about how to choose a name your computer. Choosing the right level of abstraction when naming something is important.