Aihuxn.118
net.followup
utzoo!decvax!harpo!ihnss!ihuxn!djmolny
Thu May  6 13:14:47 1982
Re: Dr. Dijkstra speaks...
One of the most annoying misconceptions about programmers is that they are
all mathematical genuises.  It seems that whenever I tell a layperson that
I program computers, they reply, "Oh, I couldn't do that, I don't know any
math!"  Well jeez, I don't either, but that doesn't slow me down any.

Hence, I was surprised to see Dijkstra speak of math and programming in
such closely related terms.  Perhaps he was referring to the branches of
math that deal with logic and proofs, but that all seems more like theoretical
than applied computer science.

Question for the day: What makes people think that computer programming
involves a lot of math?  Reply by mail, the best answer wins the source
code to 5.2 rogue.

                                               -- DJ Molny
                                               ihnss!ihuxn!djmolny

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