4 ms·

I'm probably going to regret this, but let's accept the premise that programming languages are both gendered and a product of "the patriarchy" (Sorry, Grace.).

by beloch 13y ago

I'm probably going to regret this, but let's accept the premise that programming languages are both gendered and a product of "the patriarchy" (Sorry, Grace.). How far down does the patriarchy go? Are programming languages like C and Java, which were almost all created by men with awesome beards, inherently patriarchal? As the products of male minds, this is possible. What about assembler? Well, it's pretty much dictated by the design of the processor, which is based upon older processors, and even older processors, etc.. Women helped create these, but they were in the minority. The foundations of computing are math and physics. We exploit the laws of physics to build transistors, and combine these to form flip-flops, gates, etc.. The basic logic that computers are built of is dictated by math. No matter how far I stretch, I just can't see anything gendered in transistors, logic gates, 0's and 1's. If you insist that this is not the case, then you are asking for a new branch of feminist science that has nothing in common with the science we know. Good luck! Next, we can build computer out of our basic pieces. Modern computers are big, complex, beasts, and there is certainly room for the masculine mind to assert itself in how a processor is built. However, we can abstract things a little. Let's just stick to turing machines. Is a turing machine a product of the patriarchy? If no, we can abstract a language and build it to run on a turing machine, which can then be simulated by the processors of the patriarchy, and we're off! If yes, you need to invent a fundamentally new basis for classical computing theory. Good luck! Okay, so if you believe me so far, it should be possible to build a male-cootie free language on top of a simulated turing machine. That's doable... Okay. I'm done. Honestly, I think this kind of study is akin to literary criticism. i.e. It's a lot of pretentious wanking (Sorry about using the crass sexual argot of the patriarchy). However, the essence of academia is throwing a lot of random stuff at the wall to see what sticks, and if some of it's a bit fruity, hey, why not? Fruit can stick to stuff.

phaemon 13y ago
So you should regret it. The article never uses the word "patricarchy" even once. What is it about the topic of feminism that turns half of HN into illiterate halfwits? The idea is very simple: programming languages have different philosophies behind their design. Perl would be a good example here. So what would a computer language that was designed from a feminist philosophy look like? Maybe it would be nothing new. Maybe it would be useless. Or maybe it would be great. Who knows till you try it out?
icebraining 13y ago
I think you're dismissing this based on your own prejudices about feminism and not the actual content. Thinking about what it would be to apply a certain perspective to a know field is not the same as denouncing all the existing computing field. This research has parallels with Moldbug/Yarvin's Urbit[1], which also tries to challenge the existing paradigms in computing, but because it uses the "feminism" word, HN is incapable of having an adult discussion about the topic. The response in this thread would be disappointing if it wasn't so thoroughly predictable. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6438320 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6438320
- rjknight 13y ago
  I think you're dismissing the perfectly good responses that this thread has received. I know we have this big narrative about how any discussion of feminism on HN has to be a horror show, but it's in danger of becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy if everyone keeps repeating it. (I admit to being entirely guilty of this in my own comment, and I shall try to avoid doing it again). Quite a few people have responded to this thread saying that they don't understand the OP, but the same is true of the thread about Urbit. I've been pleasantly surprised by how many of the people responding have done so in a reasonable way, stating their disagreement or their incomprehension in a way that invites someone to help explain the concepts in more detail rather than outright dismissing the possibility that there's something of value here.
  - icebraining 13y ago
    Fair enough; I didn't want to disparage the reasonable comments that this thread has (particularly yours).
- aeorgnoieang 13y ago
  Using "feminism" is a poor choice; I suspect that it was deliberately chosen because it's a loaded word.
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
rjknight 13y ago
My reading of the situation is this: In the beginning, feminists were concerned with how women were being directly oppressed by men. They fought against this, and laws were changed and social norms were changed, and now things are better than they were. As feminism has advanced, it has climbed a pyramid somewhat akin to Maslow's hierarchy[1]; as concerns about the most basic rights have been addressed, attention shifts to other matters, to questions that one might describe as "academic" or intellectual in nature - it's no longer just about freedom from violence and the right to vote, own property or control one's own body, it's about ideas and beliefs and questions which are both very fundamental to society but also somewhat abstract - philosophy, in other words. At this point, it's not unreasonable for feminists to want to re-open questions that have been settled in Western thought for centuries, on the basis that the settlement was reached almost entirely by men, and many of these men would have held sexist views which could have influenced their conclusions. Some of these re-openings will prove to be pointless - it might turn out that sexism is orthogonal to the question of logic anyhow. But it's worth checking, just to be sure. And some of the re-openings may turn out to be very useful and important. What this is not is a question about Dennis Ritchie's beard. There's no such thing as a sexist transistor or a patriarchal processor. But our notions of how these things work, of how they ought to work, and what questions are worth asking and which are irrelevant, those things are shaped by history, and we need to step back and consider the paths not chosen, because there may be possibilities deserving of consideration there. (This is basically what Bret Victor keeps telling us[2]). This is kinda why I don't really understand the geek vs feminist antagonism that everyone seems to take for granted around these parts. The feminist perspective is an outsider perspective that seeks to understand the true workings of the world, asks questions that others find awkward, disrupts outmoded institutions where necessary, and seeks to empower those who are often misunderstood and mistreated by society. That is also exactly the geek perspective. There are, of course, plenty of pretty terrible feminists who do want to make an issue out of Dennis Ritchie's beard. I think it helps to think of them as being to feminists as brogrammers are to geeks. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs [2]: http://vimeo.com/71278954 http://vimeo.com/71278954
- aeorgnoieang 13y ago
dragonwriter 13y ago
> I'm probably going to regret this, but let's accept the premise that programming languages are both gendered and a product of "the patriarchy" Why? The linked article doesn't make or depend on that argument. Your entire response seems to be based on a bunch of presumptions about the word "feminism" and not one bit of actually addressing what is presented in the linked article.

by beloch 13y ago

phaemon 13y ago

So you should regret it. The article never uses the word "patricarchy" even once. What is it about the topic of feminism that turns half of HN into illiterate halfwits? The idea is very simple: programming languages have different philosophies behind their design. Perl would be a good example here. So what would a computer language that was designed from a feminist philosophy look like? Maybe it would be nothing new. Maybe it would be useless. Or maybe it would be great. Who knows till you try it out?

icebraining 13y ago

I think you're dismissing this based on your own prejudices about feminism and not the actual content. Thinking about what it would be to apply a certain perspective to a know field is not the same as denouncing all the existing computing field. This research has parallels with Moldbug/Yarvin's Urbit[1], which also tries to challenge the existing paradigms in computing, but because it uses the "feminism" word, HN is incapable of having an adult discussion about the topic. The response in this thread would be disappointing if it wasn't so thoroughly predictable. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6438320 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6438320

rjknight 13y ago
I think you're dismissing the perfectly good responses that this thread has received. I know we have this big narrative about how any discussion of feminism on HN has to be a horror show, but it's in danger of becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy if everyone keeps repeating it. (I admit to being entirely guilty of this in my own comment, and I shall try to avoid doing it again). Quite a few people have responded to this thread saying that they don't understand the OP, but the same is true of the thread about Urbit. I've been pleasantly surprised by how many of the people responding have done so in a reasonable way, stating their disagreement or their incomprehension in a way that invites someone to help explain the concepts in more detail rather than outright dismissing the possibility that there's something of value here.
- icebraining 13y ago
  Fair enough; I didn't want to disparage the reasonable comments that this thread has (particularly yours).
aeorgnoieang 13y ago
Using "feminism" is a poor choice; I suspect that it was deliberately chosen because it's a loaded word.
- dragonwriter 13y ago

rjknight 13y ago

My reading of the situation is this: In the beginning, feminists were concerned with how women were being directly oppressed by men. They fought against this, and laws were changed and social norms were changed, and now things are better than they were. As feminism has advanced, it has climbed a pyramid somewhat akin to Maslow's hierarchy[1]; as concerns about the most basic rights have been addressed, attention shifts to other matters, to questions that one might describe as "academic" or intellectual in nature - it's no longer just about freedom from violence and the right to vote, own property or control one's own body, it's about ideas and beliefs and questions which are both very fundamental to society but also somewhat abstract - philosophy, in other words. At this point, it's not unreasonable for feminists to want to re-open questions that have been settled in Western thought for centuries, on the basis that the settlement was reached almost entirely by men, and many of these men would have held sexist views which could have influenced their conclusions. Some of these re-openings will prove to be pointless - it might turn out that sexism is orthogonal to the question of logic anyhow. But it's worth checking, just to be sure. And some of the re-openings may turn out to be very useful and important. What this is not is a question about Dennis Ritchie's beard. There's no such thing as a sexist transistor or a patriarchal processor. But our notions of how these things work, of how they ought to work, and what questions are worth asking and which are irrelevant, those things are shaped by history, and we need to step back and consider the paths not chosen, because there may be possibilities deserving of consideration there. (This is basically what Bret Victor keeps telling us[2]). This is kinda why I don't really understand the geek vs feminist antagonism that everyone seems to take for granted around these parts. The feminist perspective is an outsider perspective that seeks to understand the true workings of the world, asks questions that others find awkward, disrupts outmoded institutions where necessary, and seeks to empower those who are often misunderstood and mistreated by society. That is also exactly the geek perspective. There are, of course, plenty of pretty terrible feminists who do want to make an issue out of Dennis Ritchie's beard. I think it helps to think of them as being to feminists as brogrammers are to geeks. [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needs [2]: http://vimeo.com/71278954 http://vimeo.com/71278954

aeorgnoieang 13y ago

dragonwriter 13y ago

> I'm probably going to regret this, but let's accept the premise that programming languages are both gendered and a product of "the patriarchy" Why? The linked article doesn't make or depend on that argument. Your entire response seems to be based on a bunch of presumptions about the word "feminism" and not one bit of actually addressing what is presented in the linked article.