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I'm curious what's the history behind the use of Zen koans in computing? There seems to be a lot of that. Maybe because in programming there, often, isn't a cl
by amasad 10y ago
I'm curious what's the history behind the use of Zen koans in computing? There seems to be a lot of that.
Maybe because in programming there, often, isn't a clear right or wrong (like in this case) so it pays to structure the problem/solution as a story to make people "feel" rather than reason.
- noiv 10y agoIf I had to guess, I'd say it all started with GEB by Douglas Hofstadter. It very well explains aspects of symbol manipulation using koans. However, there might be another precursor.
- dllthomas 10y agoESR attributes the invention of the "AI koan" to Danny Hillis "while a student at MIT". Hillis graduated in 1978. GEB was published in 1979. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_koan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hacker_koan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Hillis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danny_Hillis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del,_Escher,_Bach https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/G%C3%B6del,_Escher,_Bach
- humanrebar 10y ago> Maybe because in programming there, often, isn't a clear right or wrong (like in this case) so it pays to structure the problem/solution as a story to make people "feel" rather than reason. This is pretty close to my thoughts. Though I would add that engineering often lets you solve a problem in several ways. In that way, there's no one "right answer". The exercise, instead, is to consider trade-offs. Koans (1) draw a bright line under the tension between competing but valid ideas. (1) OK. Non-ironic koans. I consider the git koans to be mostly about poking fun at git's inconsistent porcelain.