Afloyd.202
net.followup
utzoo!decvax!harpo!floyd!trb
Thu May 6 14:10:44 1982
Re: Dr. Dijkstra speaks...
I like Dr ijk's style, he doesn't mince words.
He's trying to get the idea across, and he feels that
his elegant straightforward presentation style makes
up in power what it lacks in completeness.
Imagine:
I think that I shall never see,
a poem as lovely as a tree,
Well, ya know, I'm not talking about all trees,
because some trees aren't really that lovely,
and even pretty crufty poems might be as lovely as those.
Feh!
As far as his opinion on mathematician as hacker, that's out of
context. He said that the easiest problems are the
technical/scientific ones (the usual realm of the mathematician as
hacker.) He talked about having a mathematical inclination. That's not
the same as being a mathematician, that's having your head screwed on
properly.
I got from him that the tools are going to influence the creative
abilities of their users. Ask any anthropologist. There are plenty of
Neanderthal computer applications out there, designed by Neanderthal
programmers with Neanderthal tools.
Andy Tannenbaum Bell Labs Whippany, NJ (201) 386-6491
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