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Yes, that's the standard compusci response, and that's why debates in this area are presently fruitless. I dont really care to know to what extent PHP can be wr

Yes, that's the standard compusci response, and that's why debates in this area are presently fruitless. I dont really care to know to what extent PHP can be written in first order logic, nor does that help anyone decide between PHP and Javascript (via Node), for example. With any philosophical project there are assumptions that you hold fixed and work that you assume "has been done" (or could be). Either way, I think there is substantive and helpful contributions to be made by forgetting where programming languges come from, by ignoring their syntax and by treating their standard implementations as worlds-to-be-explored. And if you like, the above statement is my starting point, and implicit rejection of the compusci approach which is to ask all the questions im ignoring.

brudgers 14y ago
That's a philosophical response, for that is my background. On the other hand, my general reaction is that the essay lacks rigor. Kant's Prolegama to Any Future Metaphysics may not set an obtainable standard for this sort of thing, but it may prove to be a useful guide. Perhaps we are always required to make assumptions in order to act philosophically - even if I am inclined toward the belief that though we start somewhere, starting to do philosophy comes earlier in the day than any decision to assume. In other words, we don't assume our starting point or arrive at it after packing our bag - once we start packing our bag, we are well into the act. I think the study of computer languages can tell us interesting things of the sort which philosophers - and particularly natural language philosophers - have found interesting over the more recent past. But I find a great-chain-of-being approach dubious in regard to generating epistemic epiphany.
- mjburgess 14y ago
  Oh it certainly lacks rigour. I was just outlining "an intention to be rigorous" to see what the response would be. There seems to be, so far, quite a lot of interest in this kind of project.
  - brudgers 14y ago
    But alas the taxonomy of programming languages is a solved problem. There is Lisp. And there is Blub. Or less t-rolled: McCarthy and Von Neuman. Or more poetic: Dionysian and Saturnial. Rigor comes in many flavors. The starting point for all of them is rigorous thinking. One of the signs that my thinking is not rigorous is that I wind up proving the point I set out to prove. Then again, setting out to prove a point ought to be a warning flag. Even if it is inevitable that I do so. The key to rigor is recognizing that I am doing it. Lisp and Blub was where I wanted to go. My dissatisfaction led me to McCarthy and Von Neuman and that to another metaphorical connection between programming languages and literary criticism. And that fits with my larger interests; those being the ones which dispose me toward writing about software.
    - mjburgess 14y ago
      As I said towards the end of the piece the intention is to come up with an abductive process an, "inference to the best representation", a formalized method for deciding between languages. I am aware that there are various taxonomies, and perhaps I shouldnt have made the aristotleian comment because it was rather misleading. My intention was to take an honest (you may say phenomenological) look at programming languages: to have a system by which the idioms of the language, its communal metalogics, etc. are all part of how we assess a language. Not the reductionism of the "procedural-functional", pre-existing landscape. I guess my point in referencing this landscape was to point out how inadequate it is, and how there might be a more complex and useful way of reasoning between languages. My next article on the subject, which I'd imagine will follow soon, will certainly be slightly refocused and clearer. This is very much a just-finished-typing first draft that I put out to see what the response would be, and what the appetite for this kind of analysis in the programming community is.

brudgers 14y ago

That's a philosophical response, for that is my background. On the other hand, my general reaction is that the essay lacks rigor. Kant's Prolegama to Any Future Metaphysics may not set an obtainable standard for this sort of thing, but it may prove to be a useful guide. Perhaps we are always required to make assumptions in order to act philosophically - even if I am inclined toward the belief that though we start somewhere, starting to do philosophy comes earlier in the day than any decision to assume. In other words, we don't assume our starting point or arrive at it after packing our bag - once we start packing our bag, we are well into the act. I think the study of computer languages can tell us interesting things of the sort which philosophers - and particularly natural language philosophers - have found interesting over the more recent past. But I find a great-chain-of-being approach dubious in regard to generating epistemic epiphany.

mjburgess 14y ago
Oh it certainly lacks rigour. I was just outlining "an intention to be rigorous" to see what the response would be. There seems to be, so far, quite a lot of interest in this kind of project.
- brudgers 14y ago
  But alas the taxonomy of programming languages is a solved problem. There is Lisp. And there is Blub. Or less t-rolled: McCarthy and Von Neuman. Or more poetic: Dionysian and Saturnial. Rigor comes in many flavors. The starting point for all of them is rigorous thinking. One of the signs that my thinking is not rigorous is that I wind up proving the point I set out to prove. Then again, setting out to prove a point ought to be a warning flag. Even if it is inevitable that I do so. The key to rigor is recognizing that I am doing it. Lisp and Blub was where I wanted to go. My dissatisfaction led me to McCarthy and Von Neuman and that to another metaphorical connection between programming languages and literary criticism. And that fits with my larger interests; those being the ones which dispose me toward writing about software.
  - mjburgess 14y ago
    As I said towards the end of the piece the intention is to come up with an abductive process an, "inference to the best representation", a formalized method for deciding between languages. I am aware that there are various taxonomies, and perhaps I shouldnt have made the aristotleian comment because it was rather misleading. My intention was to take an honest (you may say phenomenological) look at programming languages: to have a system by which the idioms of the language, its communal metalogics, etc. are all part of how we assess a language. Not the reductionism of the "procedural-functional", pre-existing landscape. I guess my point in referencing this landscape was to point out how inadequate it is, and how there might be a more complex and useful way of reasoning between languages. My next article on the subject, which I'd imagine will follow soon, will certainly be slightly refocused and clearer. This is very much a just-finished-typing first draft that I put out to see what the response would be, and what the appetite for this kind of analysis in the programming community is.