6 ms·

Off topic: Is it just me or are there any others who find naming programming languages with women's names a bit weird? Julia, Janet, Eve... I understand the g

by gwn7 5y ago

Off topic: Is it just me or are there any others who find naming programming languages with women's names a bit weird? Julia, Janet, Eve... I understand the guy referring to his car as his "girlfriend" and give it a women's name. I just can't feel the same about tech. I guess this may be the nerd's way of immortalizing their sweetheart, but if I was a woman I'd rather prefer to be a car and not a programming language. A programming language doesn't feel much anthropomorphizable to me, let alone lady-like. Women, what do you think?

avgcorrection 5y ago
No, I don’t think that giving non-objects/not objectifiable things women’s names is weird. Nor that the necessary implication is that they are named after girlfriends.
blacktriangle 5y ago
Ada, Alice... Interesting question, but it might just be a yellow volkswagon effect. Quickly looking at Wikipedia's list of languages, theres Babbage, Bertrand, Cecil, Darwin, Dylan, Escher, Euclid, Euler, Godel, Hume, Orwell, Tom, Zeno, and probably a few others I missed. EDIT: Haskell and Pascal, how embarassing to miss those
- phreack 5y ago
  I was first introduced to programming with Pascal, can't believe I forgot about it until I saw your list.
- Tommah 5y ago
  also Haskell and Pascal
  - WJW 5y ago
    It's a shame that Haskell Brooks Curry did not have any more names because all three of his names have already been used for programming languages by now.
- srcreigh 5y ago
  I also like to believe PageRank was named after Larry Page.
- zajio1am 5y ago
  It is interesting that female-named languages from your examples generally use first-name, while male-named languages generally use surname.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- hjek 5y ago
  > Haskell and Pascal, how embarassing to miss those and Curry, while we're at it, https://curry-lang.org/ https://curry-lang.org/
empthought 5y ago
Not named after a woman (or rather, named after not-a-woman): https://github.com/janet-lang/janet#why-is-it-called-janet https://github.com/janet-lang/janet#why-is-it-called-janet
- Barrin92 5y ago
  >not-a-woman given that the character of the show in question is an archetypal secretary arguing it's not a woman is a fairly big stretch. Not only is it a woman, it's a woman embodying a female stereotype, (in line with the purpose of the language, being an easy helper), and the 60s art deco woman's magazine style logo
  - avgcorrection 5y ago
    Can’t decide if “if it looks like a female secretary then it’s a woman” is progressive or backwards.
    - Barrin92 5y ago
      I suppose that depends on whether you think women should be doomed to the role but it takes some extraordinary imagination to pretend the stereotype doesn't exist, or that one gets around it by making the woman in question an artificial one kinda like if I made a software called arnold with a picture of he-man as a logo I doubt one would be considered backward for thinking I had a guy in mind
      - blacktriangle 5y ago
        Calling working as a PA "doomed" is probably the most offensive thing said yet in this thread.
  - empthought 5y ago
    Janet is canonically not a woman. It is said many times. Also not a robot.
jonstaab 5y ago
It's like naming boats after women. A recognition of the distinct nobility and beauty of women our culture has lost track of.
snicker7 5y ago
I mean, this is done well outside programming languages. See; for example, tropical hurricanes.
- hairofadog 5y ago
  That used to be true, but hurricanes haven't been named exclusively after women since 1978. > The practice of naming hurricanes solely after women came to an end in 1978 when men's and women's names were included in the Eastern North Pacific storm lists. In 1979, male and female names were included in lists for the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutnames_history.shtml https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutnames_history.shtml
dragonwriter 5y ago
> I understand the guy referring to his car as his "girlfriend" and give it a women's name. I just can't feel the same about tech. Why do you assume programming langauges with female coded names are because the creator is viewing it as a girlfriend? Not all creators are heterosexual males (or otherwise oriented toward females as preferred or even acceptable romantic partners), and even those that are don’t necessarily view women exclusively through the lens of romantic involvement such that that would be the implication of a female name. Also, not all female-coded names are actually female in reference (Janet is named after a character that is expressly not a woman.) > A programming language doesn't feel much anthropomorphizable to me, let alone lady-like. Why “let alone lady-like”? Why are female-coded names a particular issue, if the problem is that programming languages aren't “anthropomorphizable”? (I don't actually think naming things after people is inherently about anthropomorphization; we do it to freeways and bridges and other things as an honor, not as anthropomorphization.)
- gwn7 5y ago
  > Why do you assume programming langauges with female coded names are because the creator is viewing it as a girlfriend? I am not assuming that. I was just comparing it to the situation with cars. > Not all creators are heterosexual males (or otherwise oriented toward females as preferred or even acceptable romantic partners), and even those that are don’t necessarily view women exclusively through the lens of romantic involvement such that that would be the implication of a female name. I wasn't implying such a thing. But I knew a woke person was going to point it out to me anyway. Funny. > Janet is named after a character that is expressly not a woman The logo of the programming language is the face of an attractive woman wearing a lipstick and a fancy hairdo. Also, Janet is portrayed by a woman in the Good Place. Don't tell me that the name of the language has nothing to do with a woman. > Why are female-coded names a particular issue I don't think it is an issue. I was just thinking out loud. Take it easy.
  - jjnoakes 5y ago
    > I am not assuming that Well you did say: "this may be the nerd's way of immortalizing their sweetheart", which seems to me to strongly imply that your impression may be closer to assuming it than to not assuming it. I have no horse in this race (I'm not the one who replied to your original comment), but it did seem like you were assuming something awful close to what you are denying.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
eigenspace 5y ago
The julia language is claimed to not named after a woman, and it's considered to be against the community code of conduct to anthropomorphize it. People calling julia their girlfriend get asked to stop pretty quickly.

by gwn7 5y ago

avgcorrection 5y ago

No, I don’t think that giving non-objects/not objectifiable things women’s names is weird. Nor that the necessary implication is that they are named after girlfriends.

blacktriangle 5y ago

Ada, Alice... Interesting question, but it might just be a yellow volkswagon effect. Quickly looking at Wikipedia's list of languages, theres Babbage, Bertrand, Cecil, Darwin, Dylan, Escher, Euclid, Euler, Godel, Hume, Orwell, Tom, Zeno, and probably a few others I missed. EDIT: Haskell and Pascal, how embarassing to miss those

phreack 5y ago
I was first introduced to programming with Pascal, can't believe I forgot about it until I saw your list.
Tommah 5y ago
also Haskell and Pascal
- WJW 5y ago
  It's a shame that Haskell Brooks Curry did not have any more names because all three of his names have already been used for programming languages by now.
srcreigh 5y ago
I also like to believe PageRank was named after Larry Page.
zajio1am 5y ago
It is interesting that female-named languages from your examples generally use first-name, while male-named languages generally use surname.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
hjek 5y ago
> Haskell and Pascal, how embarassing to miss those and Curry, while we're at it, https://curry-lang.org/ https://curry-lang.org/

empthought 5y ago

Not named after a woman (or rather, named after not-a-woman): https://github.com/janet-lang/janet#why-is-it-called-janet https://github.com/janet-lang/janet#why-is-it-called-janet

Barrin92 5y ago
>not-a-woman given that the character of the show in question is an archetypal secretary arguing it's not a woman is a fairly big stretch. Not only is it a woman, it's a woman embodying a female stereotype, (in line with the purpose of the language, being an easy helper), and the 60s art deco woman's magazine style logo
- avgcorrection 5y ago
  Can’t decide if “if it looks like a female secretary then it’s a woman” is progressive or backwards.
  - Barrin92 5y ago
    I suppose that depends on whether you think women should be doomed to the role but it takes some extraordinary imagination to pretend the stereotype doesn't exist, or that one gets around it by making the woman in question an artificial one kinda like if I made a software called arnold with a picture of he-man as a logo I doubt one would be considered backward for thinking I had a guy in mind
    - blacktriangle 5y ago
      Calling working as a PA "doomed" is probably the most offensive thing said yet in this thread.
- empthought 5y ago
  Janet is canonically not a woman. It is said many times. Also not a robot.

jonstaab 5y ago

It's like naming boats after women. A recognition of the distinct nobility and beauty of women our culture has lost track of.

snicker7 5y ago

I mean, this is done well outside programming languages. See; for example, tropical hurricanes.

hairofadog 5y ago
That used to be true, but hurricanes haven't been named exclusively after women since 1978. > The practice of naming hurricanes solely after women came to an end in 1978 when men's and women's names were included in the Eastern North Pacific storm lists. In 1979, male and female names were included in lists for the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutnames_history.shtml https://www.nhc.noaa.gov/aboutnames_history.shtml

dragonwriter 5y ago

> I understand the guy referring to his car as his "girlfriend" and give it a women's name. I just can't feel the same about tech. Why do you assume programming langauges with female coded names are because the creator is viewing it as a girlfriend? Not all creators are heterosexual males (or otherwise oriented toward females as preferred or even acceptable romantic partners), and even those that are don’t necessarily view women exclusively through the lens of romantic involvement such that that would be the implication of a female name. Also, not all female-coded names are actually female in reference (Janet is named after a character that is expressly not a woman.) > A programming language doesn't feel much anthropomorphizable to me, let alone lady-like. Why “let alone lady-like”? Why are female-coded names a particular issue, if the problem is that programming languages aren't “anthropomorphizable”? (I don't actually think naming things after people is inherently about anthropomorphization; we do it to freeways and bridges and other things as an honor, not as anthropomorphization.)

gwn7 5y ago
> Why do you assume programming langauges with female coded names are because the creator is viewing it as a girlfriend? I am not assuming that. I was just comparing it to the situation with cars. > Not all creators are heterosexual males (or otherwise oriented toward females as preferred or even acceptable romantic partners), and even those that are don’t necessarily view women exclusively through the lens of romantic involvement such that that would be the implication of a female name. I wasn't implying such a thing. But I knew a woke person was going to point it out to me anyway. Funny. > Janet is named after a character that is expressly not a woman The logo of the programming language is the face of an attractive woman wearing a lipstick and a fancy hairdo. Also, Janet is portrayed by a woman in the Good Place. Don't tell me that the name of the language has nothing to do with a woman. > Why are female-coded names a particular issue I don't think it is an issue. I was just thinking out loud. Take it easy.
- jjnoakes 5y ago
  > I am not assuming that Well you did say: "this may be the nerd's way of immortalizing their sweetheart", which seems to me to strongly imply that your impression may be closer to assuming it than to not assuming it. I have no horse in this race (I'm not the one who replied to your original comment), but it did seem like you were assuming something awful close to what you are denying.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

eigenspace 5y ago

The julia language is claimed to not named after a woman, and it's considered to be against the community code of conduct to anthropomorphize it. People calling julia their girlfriend get asked to stop pretty quickly.