4 ms·

Wouldn't you say not always reusing the same two names is "a bit more flexible"?

Ekaros 5y ago
We should question is more flexibility always a good thing? We have lot of established words and concepts? Should we be more flexible and invent new ones every time we try to communicate something? Or maybe cultural references too? Change those too why not? Maybe use Bob and Alice to refer story of two lovers ending in tragic end?
- southerntofu 5y ago
  > We should question is more flexibility always a good thing? In general, i would say so. A great deal of wars and suffering would be avoided if people were slightly more flexible and not so much into ethnocentric interpretations of the world. > invent new ones every time we try to communicate something? When explaining other concepts than cryptography, do you systematically borrow the same names? I guess not. Why would cryptography be any different?
  - Ekaros 5y ago
    In math variable names x, y, z are very common. Same goes for angles with greek alphabet. Maybe we should sometimes replace these with characters from other cultures? Maybe in programming we should start using things like umlauts as variables in short loops...
    - southerntofu 5y ago
      > Maybe we should sometimes replace these with characters from other cultures? Isn't that precisely what you're advocating for with angles and the greek alphabet? I don't know about you, but i personally had to learn about greek letters in math classes, and that's something i could have done without, especially when there's other standard means of designating an angle.
      - Ekaros 5y ago
        I was thinking picking something from let's say Korean, Japanese or Chinese. After all I have understood we shouldn't be too western.
josephcsible 5y ago
But they're not saying "don't always use the names Alice and Bob." They're saying "you're never again allowed to use the names Alice and Bob."
- southerntofu 5y ago
  That's not what i read in the article, and i think noone is making that point. You deformed the argument to make it appear ridiculous, whether consciously or not. It's as if you claimed anti-sexism in the cinema industry means never again having men on screen. There is no thought police coming for you if you disagree with a rather-insignificant change. But of course feeling threatened by better representation of different cultures in education is weird. That kind of argument is directly rehearsed from the neofascist international movement (Generation Identitaire & friends) and their "great replacement" / "clash of cultures" theory. I'm not saying you belong to that movement or that you're a despicable human being in any regard (i've never met you and barely interacted with you), but i would recommend to question that kind of racist narrative pushed by mainstream media in the last decade or so (especially since the start of the so-called "migrant crisis").
xhkkffbf 5y ago
First, the rule is never to use them for cultural reasons and that just replaces the cultural hegemony of one group with another. Second, there's an advantage to everyone using the same names again and again. When I see the names, I know it's going to be a protocol discussion. If someone inserts, say, a Chinese name in the proper unicode with a slavic name in cyrilic, I've got to think and try to figure out what is going on. Eventually I'll catch on, but it slows down comprehension.
- southerntofu 5y ago
  > never to use them for cultural reasons Where was it suggested that Alice and Bob names be banned altogether? Having one class/university use different names is far from erasure. > replaces the cultural hegemony of one group with another What new group would that be dominating the narrative? Is "all other cultures than anglo-saxon" a unified cultural group? Is this hypothetical group exerting power over others in what can be called "cultural hegemony" (cultural domination)? From my perspective as a white French person, who was taught in schools/media that colonization was a virtuous enterprise to civilize lesser cultures, power is still vastly in the hands of racist misogynist people who control the entirety of the State apparatus and 95% of european economy. Having a few pockets of resistance challenge that status quo is barely a threat to the establishment. > If someone inserts, say, a Chinese name in the proper unicode with a slavic name in cyrilic, I've got to think and try to figure out what is going on. Of course. Just like a person learning cryptography in Russian/Chinese language can have a harder time to decipher what "Alice" and "Bob" are. But in this case, lessons are given in English using the latin alphabet: the suggestion was to use more diverse names, which does not require using a different alphabet.

We should question is more flexibility always a good thing? We have lot of established words and concepts? Should we be more flexible and invent new ones every time we try to communicate something? Or maybe cultural references too? Change those too why not? Maybe use Bob and Alice to refer story of two lovers ending in tragic end?

southerntofu 5y ago
> We should question is more flexibility always a good thing? In general, i would say so. A great deal of wars and suffering would be avoided if people were slightly more flexible and not so much into ethnocentric interpretations of the world. > invent new ones every time we try to communicate something? When explaining other concepts than cryptography, do you systematically borrow the same names? I guess not. Why would cryptography be any different?
- Ekaros 5y ago
  In math variable names x, y, z are very common. Same goes for angles with greek alphabet. Maybe we should sometimes replace these with characters from other cultures? Maybe in programming we should start using things like umlauts as variables in short loops...
  - southerntofu 5y ago
    > Maybe we should sometimes replace these with characters from other cultures? Isn't that precisely what you're advocating for with angles and the greek alphabet? I don't know about you, but i personally had to learn about greek letters in math classes, and that's something i could have done without, especially when there's other standard means of designating an angle.
    - Ekaros 5y ago
      I was thinking picking something from let's say Korean, Japanese or Chinese. After all I have understood we shouldn't be too western.

josephcsible 5y ago

But they're not saying "don't always use the names Alice and Bob." They're saying "you're never again allowed to use the names Alice and Bob."

southerntofu 5y ago
That's not what i read in the article, and i think noone is making that point. You deformed the argument to make it appear ridiculous, whether consciously or not. It's as if you claimed anti-sexism in the cinema industry means never again having men on screen. There is no thought police coming for you if you disagree with a rather-insignificant change. But of course feeling threatened by better representation of different cultures in education is weird. That kind of argument is directly rehearsed from the neofascist international movement (Generation Identitaire & friends) and their "great replacement" / "clash of cultures" theory. I'm not saying you belong to that movement or that you're a despicable human being in any regard (i've never met you and barely interacted with you), but i would recommend to question that kind of racist narrative pushed by mainstream media in the last decade or so (especially since the start of the so-called "migrant crisis").

xhkkffbf 5y ago

First, the rule is never to use them for cultural reasons and that just replaces the cultural hegemony of one group with another. Second, there's an advantage to everyone using the same names again and again. When I see the names, I know it's going to be a protocol discussion. If someone inserts, say, a Chinese name in the proper unicode with a slavic name in cyrilic, I've got to think and try to figure out what is going on. Eventually I'll catch on, but it slows down comprehension.

southerntofu 5y ago
> never to use them for cultural reasons Where was it suggested that Alice and Bob names be banned altogether? Having one class/university use different names is far from erasure. > replaces the cultural hegemony of one group with another What new group would that be dominating the narrative? Is "all other cultures than anglo-saxon" a unified cultural group? Is this hypothetical group exerting power over others in what can be called "cultural hegemony" (cultural domination)? From my perspective as a white French person, who was taught in schools/media that colonization was a virtuous enterprise to civilize lesser cultures, power is still vastly in the hands of racist misogynist people who control the entirety of the State apparatus and 95% of european economy. Having a few pockets of resistance challenge that status quo is barely a threat to the establishment. > If someone inserts, say, a Chinese name in the proper unicode with a slavic name in cyrilic, I've got to think and try to figure out what is going on. Of course. Just like a person learning cryptography in Russian/Chinese language can have a harder time to decipher what "Alice" and "Bob" are. But in this case, lessons are given in English using the latin alphabet: the suggestion was to use more diverse names, which does not require using a different alphabet.