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The phrase "Toward a new..." is very nearly a sure sign of relativism at work. I don't know why so many quacks pick it. I guess they think they're revolutionizi
by anonemouse145 10y ago
The phrase "Toward a new..." is very nearly a sure sign of relativism at work. I don't know why so many quacks pick it. I guess they think they're revolutionizing the world.
This article pushes for an ethics and feelings based redistribution of programming effort. That's bad. Because resources remain finite, we won't lose less data, we can only shuffle around what we lose. What we need to make this decision, is not feelings or vague ethical codes. We need hard data, especially in an age of big data and machine learning where the detailed pieces involved in making a deep statistical analysis may well be out of the realm of human comprehension.
For example, this article targets the evil gender binary. If only we would think more carefully about our choices. Meanwhile, clinics are scratching their heads trying to figure out how to map rates of ovarian cancer to "demisexuals", or how a local rise in "non-binary asexuals" might affect rates of testicular cancer, and what should be done about funding for screenings.
We lose data because we come from an era where space was limited, and cycles were counted. Sure we made some dumb mistakes like 2 digit years, but 2 digit years still work in a broad array of cases so we still use them all over the place today. They are sometimes good to use, sometimes bad, sometimes they're superfluous and unused anyway.
By all means rethink what fields should be compressed or expanded based upon business needs. But do it based on data and business use cases, not on feelings and someone's personal bias- even if that person promises their ethics are better than the old ones.
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- dwaltrip 10y agoI think the essay was more about double checking the assumptions and particular world views we bring with us when we write code. Even the most mundane software can distinctly embody specific views that some might take for granted, not acknowledging that others have genuine reasons for viewing that specific dynamic differently. We need to be willing to explore the assumptions, known or unknown, that we carry with us when we create software. Software doesn't exist in a vacuum. It is part of a rich, ever changing context of culture, social systems, and all the messiness of being human. Each human action is the expression of a complex set of viewpoints, and technology is not perfectly neutral. I think, occasionally, some (not all) hackerish types are less interested in exploring this side of things and think they can avoid it by sticking with software. The essay was trying to remind people that you can't truly avoid expressing viewpoints with your actions, even in software.
- webmaven 10y ago> We need to be willing to explore the assumptions, known or unknown, that we carry with us when we create software. Hear, hear. I have two other longstanding favorite examinations-of-assumptions pieces: "Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Names"[0], and "Five Geek Social Fallacies"[1] [0] https://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-believe-about-names/ https://www.kalzumeus.com/2010/06/17/falsehoods-programmers-... [1] http://www.plausiblydeniable.com/opinion/gsf.html http://www.plausiblydeniable.com/opinion/gsf.html
- mjg59 10y ago> Meanwhile, clinics are scratching their heads trying to figure out how to map rates of ovarian cancer to "demisexuals", or how a local rise in "non-binary asexuals" might affect rates of testicular cancer, and what should be done about funding for screenings. This is a great case in point! Simply classing people as male or female already loses data that's therapeutically relevant. The important thing in determining whether someone's at risk of ovarian or testicular cancer isn't whether they're male or female - it's whether they have ovaries or testes. Some people have both, some people have neither and some people do not have the set you'd expect from their gender. Assuming that "Male" or "Female" accurately describes this is exactly the kind of "forgetting" discussed in the article, and people lose out on appropriate healthcare as a result.
- qb45 10y ago> Some people have both I don't think this particular combination is possible, for the record.