4 ms·

> Feeling smart? Lets change that. No. No you did not. Thanks for reminding me why academia is a wasteland.

by jheriko 4y ago

swagmoney1606 4y ago
Can you elaborate on what you are saying here? Why is academia a wasteland?
- nh23423fefe 4y ago
  Sometimes people read jokes and they get self-conscious and lash out.
  - mrkeen 4y ago
    Easy fix - just read the reply charitably as well. Now you have two jokes.
- reikonomusha 4y ago
  I'll try to elaborate in a productive manner. More likely than not, the author was just trying to make joke—possibly even self-deprecating. From Haskell programmer to Haskell programmer, this specific joke might even be kind of funny: What's ahead is clearly not "normal" Haskell, and will be quite puzzling at first glance. Haskell has lots of these zingers that Haskell programmers have come to either enjoy or respect. (The "zygohistomorphic prepromorphism" joke is another old one.) The joke being made, while in jest, may also serve to be a sort of hook; the reader may respond internally "I am smart enough!" and proceed to try to crack the puzzle. However, the joke might feel tone-deaf to the non-Haskell community, and feel absurdly pretentious. To many, Haskell itself is already quite unapproachable. Even with efforts to make Haskell seem like a "normal programmer's language", it still has a reputation for being academic, mathematical, buried in abstraction, and otherworldly. To a non-Haskell programmer, the joke comes across as pretentious: I will show you one simple line of code that I guarantee you are not intelligent enough to understand. It's a joke the author really savors too, since the author spends a couple paragraphs dedicated to it. The HN crowd is probably one of the best audiences to share something interesting about Haskell, because curiosity is a sort of "core tenet" of the culture here. But I think those who are curious like learning from people who want to share their knowledge with empathy and compassion. Haskell, deserved or not, is so steeped in its reputation of unapproachability—something many HNers are carrying with them into the article—that the final stomp of "you're not smart" is just a perfect way to turn somebody off and away. I do think that, in this case, the general academic feeling of Haskell is a critical component to understanding why this joke may be a turn-off to many. If it were a goofy piece of JavaScript, where everybody and their dog knows that it's "Bad JavaScript" (TM), it wouldn't have the same feeling of lacking compassion for the reader, I think. Just my 2¢. :)
  - ghostwriter 4y ago
    > However, the joke might feel tone-deaf to the non-Haskell community, and feel absurdly pretentious. [...] To a non-Haskell programmer, the joke comes across as pretentious: I will show you one simple line of code that I guarantee you are not intelligent enough to understand. How's that different to a humorous basketball/hockey/football dribbling demonstrated by a pro-player on a youtube video for their audience's awe and admiration? I bet no one is treating it as "pretentious" at those moments, in fact many of the younger folks regularly get inspired by this kind of performances to start in the sport. These types of depreciating and other-party-blaming comments tend to come from ego-offended senior developers who're used to thinking that they can always pick a new programming language in 20 minutes or so, because all of them resemble their favourite flavour of $java (not really).
    - reikonomusha 4y ago
      I think the critical difference is that said basketball player doesn't open their demonstration by challenging the audience's intelligence explicitly. I don't want to personally say whether the joke in the article is in good taste or not, and I don't want to assess whether programmers' egos are too fragile or sensitive. I don't think that's productive. I do, however, want to emphasize that when read by a broader audience than just the community of Haskell programmers, due in part to Haskell's reputation, the joke lands as off-color, as the G*P comment demonstrates.
    - viraptor 4y ago
      > a humorous basketball/hockey/football dribbling demonstrated by a pro-player on a youtube video for their audience's awe and admiration Oh, you can totally do that in a pretentious and insulting way. There's lots of "(someone) took over and amazed the crowd" style videos where it seems like the pro is inserting themselves into the situation to awe people in a very cringe way. The worst ones in that style are the videos of that one guy joining buskers to show off his boogie piano skills while they sometimes enjoy it and sometimes just look like they wait for him to leave. (can't find the channel, I blocked him)
  - klabb3 4y ago
quchen 4y ago
FWIW I program my CNC with Haskell, how's that for academic
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- 1letterunixname 4y ago
  Unfortunately, it's nothing new. America's mainstream historical ethos derives from a deep anti-intellectual sentiment of an expat merchant class who frowned upon academia and the Old World. The Puritans at least left a positive legacy in Boston, despite generally shunning ideas and people who dared to think differently. The American frontier acted as a risk tolerance filter of peoples from around the world to emigrate. There are systemic problems of economic and policing inequality, and under-socialism in the US. How does America receive those from distant lands now? What future does America have without prestigious, selective academic institutions except a brain drain exodus?
  - quchen 4y ago
    That’s a very interesting take on things I haven’t heard before, but it seems plausible! Thanks for the insight :-)

> Feeling smart? Lets change that. No. No you did not. Thanks for reminding me why academia is a wasteland.

swagmoney1606 4y ago

Can you elaborate on what you are saying here? Why is academia a wasteland?

nh23423fefe 4y ago
Sometimes people read jokes and they get self-conscious and lash out.
- mrkeen 4y ago
  Easy fix - just read the reply charitably as well. Now you have two jokes.
reikonomusha 4y ago
I'll try to elaborate in a productive manner. More likely than not, the author was just trying to make joke—possibly even self-deprecating. From Haskell programmer to Haskell programmer, this specific joke might even be kind of funny: What's ahead is clearly not "normal" Haskell, and will be quite puzzling at first glance. Haskell has lots of these zingers that Haskell programmers have come to either enjoy or respect. (The "zygohistomorphic prepromorphism" joke is another old one.) The joke being made, while in jest, may also serve to be a sort of hook; the reader may respond internally "I am smart enough!" and proceed to try to crack the puzzle. However, the joke might feel tone-deaf to the non-Haskell community, and feel absurdly pretentious. To many, Haskell itself is already quite unapproachable. Even with efforts to make Haskell seem like a "normal programmer's language", it still has a reputation for being academic, mathematical, buried in abstraction, and otherworldly. To a non-Haskell programmer, the joke comes across as pretentious: I will show you one simple line of code that I guarantee you are not intelligent enough to understand. It's a joke the author really savors too, since the author spends a couple paragraphs dedicated to it. The HN crowd is probably one of the best audiences to share something interesting about Haskell, because curiosity is a sort of "core tenet" of the culture here. But I think those who are curious like learning from people who want to share their knowledge with empathy and compassion. Haskell, deserved or not, is so steeped in its reputation of unapproachability—something many HNers are carrying with them into the article—that the final stomp of "you're not smart" is just a perfect way to turn somebody off and away. I do think that, in this case, the general academic feeling of Haskell is a critical component to understanding why this joke may be a turn-off to many. If it were a goofy piece of JavaScript, where everybody and their dog knows that it's "Bad JavaScript" (TM), it wouldn't have the same feeling of lacking compassion for the reader, I think. Just my 2¢. :)
- ghostwriter 4y ago
  > However, the joke might feel tone-deaf to the non-Haskell community, and feel absurdly pretentious. [...] To a non-Haskell programmer, the joke comes across as pretentious: I will show you one simple line of code that I guarantee you are not intelligent enough to understand. How's that different to a humorous basketball/hockey/football dribbling demonstrated by a pro-player on a youtube video for their audience's awe and admiration? I bet no one is treating it as "pretentious" at those moments, in fact many of the younger folks regularly get inspired by this kind of performances to start in the sport. These types of depreciating and other-party-blaming comments tend to come from ego-offended senior developers who're used to thinking that they can always pick a new programming language in 20 minutes or so, because all of them resemble their favourite flavour of $java (not really).
  - reikonomusha 4y ago
    I think the critical difference is that said basketball player doesn't open their demonstration by challenging the audience's intelligence explicitly. I don't want to personally say whether the joke in the article is in good taste or not, and I don't want to assess whether programmers' egos are too fragile or sensitive. I don't think that's productive. I do, however, want to emphasize that when read by a broader audience than just the community of Haskell programmers, due in part to Haskell's reputation, the joke lands as off-color, as the G*P comment demonstrates.
  - viraptor 4y ago
    > a humorous basketball/hockey/football dribbling demonstrated by a pro-player on a youtube video for their audience's awe and admiration Oh, you can totally do that in a pretentious and insulting way. There's lots of "(someone) took over and amazed the crowd" style videos where it seems like the pro is inserting themselves into the situation to awe people in a very cringe way. The worst ones in that style are the videos of that one guy joining buskers to show off his boogie piano skills while they sometimes enjoy it and sometimes just look like they wait for him to leave. (can't find the channel, I blocked him)
- klabb3 4y ago

quchen 4y ago

FWIW I program my CNC with Haskell, how's that for academic

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
1letterunixname 4y ago
Unfortunately, it's nothing new. America's mainstream historical ethos derives from a deep anti-intellectual sentiment of an expat merchant class who frowned upon academia and the Old World. The Puritans at least left a positive legacy in Boston, despite generally shunning ideas and people who dared to think differently. The American frontier acted as a risk tolerance filter of peoples from around the world to emigrate. There are systemic problems of economic and policing inequality, and under-socialism in the US. How does America receive those from distant lands now? What future does America have without prestigious, selective academic institutions except a brain drain exodus?
- quchen 4y ago
  That’s a very interesting take on things I haven’t heard before, but it seems plausible! Thanks for the insight :-)