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The problem with non-ASCII is that it's harder to read, because the pronunciation (even if only mental) is ambiguous. Imagine if you don't know how to pronounce
by maxwell 16y ago
The problem with non-ASCII is that it's harder to read, because the pronunciation (even if only mental) is ambiguous. Imagine if you don't know how to pronounce Greek letters, for instance. I couldn't begin to pronounce APL, and thus would have to remember shapes.
I think this is the reason everyone has an issue with Lisp's prefix notation for arithmetic. They read
(+ 1 2 3)
as "plus one two three" and it sounds weird. I wonder if a Lisp would sell if you only allowed alphanumeric function names, e.g.
(sum 1 2 3)
(Not to mention that "Lisp" is the worst name ever.)
It's just a hunch, but I suspect the root cause for European imperialistic domination was that they had a more accessible writing notation. It could even be that the difficulty of Chinese writing actually produced "more Edisons", but likewise prevented diffusion. And if James Burke has taught me anything, it's that communication is way more important than inspiration or perspiration.
It's exactly like Lisp. As it took Europe centuries to catch up with Chinese technology, it seems likely that it'll take Algol-style langs a century to catch up with Lisp concepts.
- jessriedel 16y agoBut your argument could be applied to mathematics, where powerful, non-ASCII symbols are very useful. What's different about programming?
- maxwell 16y agoNothing. I think non-ASCII symbols are a net loss in mathematics too. While they're powerful (taking succinctness to be equal to power), they come at the expense of accessibility. With great power comes great power consumption; there's a reason most people don't have jet engines under their hood or read mathematics: doing so is very expensive. I believe the cognitive cost outweighs the expressive benefit.
- jeangenie 16y ago>> It's just a hunch, but I suspect the root cause for European imperialistic domination was that they had a more accessible writing notation. the greeks devised a fantastic writing system, including representations of vowels (which its predecessor lacked). aristotle was the first person to say words should be separated when written (before all letters were run together, leaving the reader to unscramble). your claim is a stretch, but it's interesting to note that reliable and easy ways to communicate and sustain our collective knowledge have become unexpectedly critical.