Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

rebelscience.blogspot.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–19 of 19 posts

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#11

Post by jacquesm »

MaysonL wrote: post #9

If anyone is interested in a more impressive take on impending progress with parallel computation, they should take a look at the Ph.D. thesis: Propagation Networks: A Flexible and Expressive Substrate for Computation .[1] Thesis supervisor: Gerry Sussman. Thesis committee: Guy Steele Jr., Patrick Winston, and Tom Knight. Opening paragraph: *"REVOLUTION is at hand. The revolution everyone talks about is, of course, t…

Fair warning that's a 176 page pdf.

That's worth posting separately.

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#12

Post by miriam »

Fixnum wrote: post #10
jacquesm wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More enlightened reading: http://www.rebelscience.org/discussion/viewtopic.php?f=5&#38...

Moreover, http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=miriam . Flagging this story so people don't have to waste their time.

Wow. He must have struck a raw nerve.

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#13

Post by jacquesm »

miriam wrote: post #12
Fixnum wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moreover, http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=miriam . Flagging this story so people don't have to waste their time.

Wow. He must have struck a raw nerve.

Why ?

That's what flagging is for, getting rid of spam and nonsense.

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#14

Post by miriam »

jacquesm wrote: post #2

> Turing is so revered that the most coveted prize in computer science, the A. M. Turing Award, was named after him. It is worth noting that Turing’s sexual inclinations and religious convictions did little to diminish his notoriety. Homosexual and atheist movements around the world have wasted not time in transforming the man into a martyr and the sad history of his life into a veritable cause célèbre. The end resul…

As they say, opinions are a dime a dozen. The author would say that, if the Turing Machine was relevant to parallel programming, we would not have a parallel programming crisis and you would not be reading this and getting all twisted out of shape because your idol is not what he's made out to be.

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#16

Post by jacquesm »

miriam wrote: post #14
jacquesm wrote: post #2

> Turing is so revered that the most coveted prize in computer science, the A. M. Turing Award, was named after him. It is worth noting that Turing’s sexual inclinations and religious convictions did little to diminish his notoriety. Homosexual and atheist movements around the world have wasted not time in transforming the man into a martyr and the sad history of his life into a veritable cause célèbre. The end resul…

As they say, opinions are a dime a dozen. The author would say that, if the Turing Machine was relevant to parallel programming, we would not have a parallel programming crisis and you would not be reading this and getting all twisted out of shape because your idol is not what he's made out to be.

Since your posting history is intricately entwined with rebel science would it be fair to ask you if you are somehow affiliated ?

So, then I could answer you like this:

I don't have any idols, and Alan Turing wouldn't be one of them but I recognize the man for what he's done and I think that personal attacks have no place in a scientific argument.

By twisting this into an argument about people the 'author' (you ?) displays a shocking lack of tact and detracts from his argument, assuming he has any to make.

The 'parallel programming crisis', as you name it is a reality, there are plenty of people working hard on getting a handle on it, and somehow all of those that are actually productive manage to do that without resorting to personal attacks. Slinging mud at a famous person is one way to become notorious, but it is not a way to achieve anything.

Achievement comes from simply going to work.

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#17

Post by jacquesm »

hacknews wrote: post #8

I didn't expect to get such a good laugh out of a HN linked article. Ahhh, what does the future hold for me now?

That's penance in the cobol dungeons for you.

Not until you've written a functional equivalent of emacs using nothing but a card punch and a Univac 1108 will you be released.

Re: Parallel Computing: The End of the Turing Madness

#19

Post by miriam »

jacquesm wrote: post #16
miriam wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As they say, opinions are a dime a dozen. The author would say that, if the Turing Machine was relevant to parallel programming, we would not have a parallel programming crisis and you would not be reading this and getting all twisted out of shape because your idol is not what he's made out to be.

Since your posting history is intricately entwined with rebel science would it be fair to ask you if you are somehow affiliated ? So, then I could answer you like this: I don't have any idols, and Alan Turing wouldn't be one of them but I recognize the man for what he's done and I think that personal attacks have no place in a scientific argument. By twisting this into an argument about people the 'author' (you ?) di…

Oh, I get it. Somebody offended your false god. Too bad.
Post reply on HN