[X4U] System files being deleted! (/dev/stdout...)

[John Tsombakos]

I was trying to use the Activity Monitor to do a Sample of an application. 
When clicking the Sample button, Activity Monitor would generate an error:

fopen: Operation not supported
Unable to open/create sample file /dev/stdout

And sure enough, /dev/stdout was missing. Along with /dev/stdin, /dev/
stderr and the directory /dev/fd!

Restarting brought them back, but soon after they were gone again! I have no 
idea what could be removing those files.

This is on Tiger, and on 3 different machines.

Anyone have any idea what could cause those files to be deleted?

Thanks, 
John