The Personal Website of Michael Foord

I'll soon be available for new work opportunities. I'm looking for primarily remote software engineering or technology roles, in either Python or Python and Go. I can be reached at michael AT python DOT org. Note: I have now taken on a full-time role with Red Hat and am not currently seeking work. I believe that software engineering is as much of an art and a craft as it is a science. I believe that engineers should care about usability, and that encompasses the whole of the human computer interface from direct user experience to API design. I’m passionate in my belief that testing must be part of engineering if we are to really care about quality. I believe, and my experience has been, that we can ensure quality in what we produce through good practises and processes, whilst understanding that there are always trade-offs involved. Quality means systems that work, that are stable and that can be easily maintained and extended. Career Highlights in a Nutshell

One of the reasons I call myself a feminist is the horrible damage that the "normal" expectations of the male stereotype did to me when I was younger. Those expectations actively ruined my life for a while (which was entirely my responsibility and fault that I let it happen). Whilst at university I was so ashamed of being a virgin that I let pursuing sex (very, very badly because of how bound up I was) take over my life - to the extent that the humiliation of the things I did and said in pursuit of that were a substantial factor in my drug psychosis which resulted in homelessness and years spent rebuilding my psyche (obviously the copious quantities of LSD were also a substantial factor). So I can personally attest that the societal pressure to conform to the male role is, and can be, horribly damaging to men. Feminism, the pursuit of real equality and the destruction of "normal gender roles" is the movement I see actively working against this - and it can

All that exists is now. All that ever will exist, or ever has existed, is this tiny moment. And how precious it is. How worth fighting for, this fleeting instant It dances, it is and we are.

Theodicy in a nutshell. If God created everything, then God created suffering. If, as Christian doctrine teaches and indeed is the pursuit of the Christian practise, we are headed for a state where suffering and evil is not even possible, why did God not choose just to start there instead of putting us through all this? (Assuming that perfect love is God, as is the experience and premise of Progressive Christianity.) Because evil is even a theoretical possibility the only theoretical solution is that we must live in a universe where evil is defeated. What we now experience is the outworking of that. That is one philosophical answer. To put it another way. Even if God just created heaven and paradise, if evil was even just a theoretical possibility then eventually - given enough time - it would happen. Creation would fall and evil must be defeated. And so, here we are. In order for evil to not even be possible it must have happened and been defeated. So the way things are is the only wa