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Maybe not Jobs, Gates, or Zuckerberg. But Turing, Von Neuman, Dijkstra, and the like have. Newton and Einstein certainly changed the world, but modern physics

by vlahmot 13y ago

Maybe not Jobs, Gates, or Zuckerberg. But Turing, Von Neuman, Dijkstra, and the like have. Newton and Einstein certainly changed the world, but modern physics would be untenable without computation. The LHC would be useless without the ability to deal with the data. Computation is being used to revolutionize higher education from me being able to take learn CS from professors at top ranking universities for free to data analysis being used to develop more effective teaching methods in inner city schools. Do you imagine that the next big antibiotic or vaccine will be possible without computational effort? I imagine Ghandi would appreciate the power that the web has brought to individuals in voicing their opinions, in organizing against oppression, etc. There is far more to programming than Facebook and iPhones. That being said, his quote is quite arrogant.

larrys 13y ago
"Gates, or Zuckerberg" Perhaps not as a programmer but as a business person? Gates (along with IBM and a zillion other things coming together at the same time) have allowed the popularization of computers and reduced the cost to allow many things to happen as a result of what they have done. Think of medical advances as a result of people who were able to cut their teeth on computers and/or components dropping in price. If no PC, no YC or PG and all that follows from that. Etc. Things invented lead to other things. In that sense even Zuckerberg has changed the world by the associations that people have made that have lead to something because of who they met or became friendly with on Facebook. The question is really how do you define "change the world"? And how do you separate one persons involvement from just what happened to be around at the time and would have happened anyway had someone else done it first?
gaius 13y ago
Gates can reasonably claim credit for taking computing away from the high priesthood and giving it to the masses. Sure it might have happened without him, but he's the one who actually did it. You're right about the other two.

by vlahmot 13y ago

larrys 13y ago

"Gates, or Zuckerberg" Perhaps not as a programmer but as a business person? Gates (along with IBM and a zillion other things coming together at the same time) have allowed the popularization of computers and reduced the cost to allow many things to happen as a result of what they have done. Think of medical advances as a result of people who were able to cut their teeth on computers and/or components dropping in price. If no PC, no YC or PG and all that follows from that. Etc. Things invented lead to other things. In that sense even Zuckerberg has changed the world by the associations that people have made that have lead to something because of who they met or became friendly with on Facebook. The question is really how do you define "change the world"? And how do you separate one persons involvement from just what happened to be around at the time and would have happened anyway had someone else done it first?

gaius 13y ago

Gates can reasonably claim credit for taking computing away from the high priesthood and giving it to the masses. Sure it might have happened without him, but he's the one who actually did it. You're right about the other two.