Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014) • Hacker News Board

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#51

Post by Synaesthesia » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 8:56 AM UTC

herodoturtle wrote: post #28

Ice_cream_suit wrote: post #17

In most active and growing fields ( medicine is one example ), the history of the field is generally ignored by students and practitioners. There are a few pleasant exceptions. For instance, Neurology Minute have had occassional bits on the history of neurology. See https://neurologyminute.libsyn.com/ However, when reading something historical ( for instance this interesting podcast on the history of the Inverted Bra…

Funny you should mention Neurology in this context - my experience in South Africa has been the same. South Africa is renowned for grooming some of the world's best doctors (as subjective as this sounds, it is largely owed to the relentless influx of patients in state hospitals and the inevitable hands-on experience that follows). So practically speaking, you have some very young yet very experienced doctors emerging…

That sounds fascinating. Can't wait for you to finish that. I also live in Pretoria. You know we have the national library here, which I've never visited, but I'm interested in SA history. Cheers, Paul

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#52

Post by lowdose » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:08 AM UTC

thundergolfer wrote: post #40

blt wrote: post #10

As a computer science graduate student, I am always surprised by how rarely my peers seem to know or care about the history of our field. I doubt many of them would write papers about computer science history even if the incentives were better. I think it is somehow related to the power of computer science to change the human condition. Everyone is thinking about the future. Mathematicians also crave novelty, but I d…

A favourite quote, that appears on my Github profile: > Computing is pop culture. [...] Pop culture holds a disdain for history. Pop culture is all about identity and feeling like you're participating, It has nothing to do with cooperation, the past or the future—it's living in the present. I think the same is true of most people who write code for money. They have no idea where [their culture came from]. - Alan Kay…

To make new pop culture cooperation is necessary otherwise a culture stays niche. Diffusion of new culture works exactly as diffusion of technology from innovators to late adopters. The paradox with culture is that when an innovation is adopted in the mainstream late adopters do not perceive it as innovation because it is now the normal thing to do. Innovators do because brands validate new behavior, values and rituals that are contrarian to the status quo.

Nike & BLM, Tesla & global warming, Apple and computing without a 1000 page manual.

Nike validated Kaepernick at a moment for the first time that more kids of color are born than white.

https://www.slideshare.net/superbrands_poland/douglas-holt-h...

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#53

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:09 AM UTC

mikewarot wrote: post #35

C4ne wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I find the comparison between medicine and computer science very interesting! I have never thought about it this way. Could you elaborate on how you „dig back“? Do you read old papers / books? I imagine that one would have to dig through much old stuff that just isn‘t interesting until you find something that could be really usefull (like capability based security).

Look at the recent talks by Alan Kay, Ted Nelson, Joe Armstrong on YouTube. Watch "The Mother of all Demos" by Douglass Engelbart. There is a lot of stuff online, just follow the threads. I've been pushing Capability Based Security for a decade... only in the last 6 hours did I learn that they had it at Xerox PARC, in an offhanded comment by Ted Nelson at the end of one of his videos, where he mentions the great idea…

[deleted]

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#54

Post by cromwellian » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:09 AM UTC

Wow, He used my wife's portrait of himself. I was there the day she took it, it was the opportunity of a lifetime to meet one of my heroes, and he didn't disappoint. Knuth is incredibly sharp, lightning sharp for his age. He plays Emacs as masterfully as he plays his pipe organ in his home. I watched as he whipped around different buffers of literate programming, as he demoed some new angle on the properties of Sudoku solving algorithms. I asked him if he had been keeping up with machine learning, and he instantly name-dropped a dozen papers/authors he had read recently.

I have to say, I'm worried. Just in 2020, we lost of a lot of greats, including Jon Conway, Larry Tessler, Chuck Peddle, Bert Sutherland, Frances Allen, most recently Brad Cox. We're losing not just a lot of history, but a lot of the historians themselves, the people to whom can tell the stories that may not have been written down yet.

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#55

Post by Mauricebranagh » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:12 AM UTC

thundergolfer wrote: post #40

blt wrote: post #10

As a computer science graduate student, I am always surprised by how rarely my peers seem to know or care about the history of our field. I doubt many of them would write papers about computer science history even if the incentives were better. I think it is somehow related to the power of computer science to change the human condition. Everyone is thinking about the future. Mathematicians also crave novelty, but I d…

A favourite quote, that appears on my Github profile: > Computing is pop culture. [...] Pop culture holds a disdain for history. Pop culture is all about identity and feeling like you're participating, It has nothing to do with cooperation, the past or the future—it's living in the present. I think the same is true of most people who write code for money. They have no idea where [their culture came from]. - Alan Kay…

The problem with this blanket rejection of "pop culture" as something lesser is that its almost always deployed by "young fogey" conservatives, harkening back to so golden imperial age.

And of course these sort of people don't actually have any in depth historical knowledge.

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#56

Post by andi999 » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:12 AM UTC

mikewarot wrote: post #27

Unlike Medicine, many of the ideas that we had in the past were better than the commonly accepted way things are done now. Capability based security, for example was something that allowed you to run any program, with no danger to your system. It's not part of any common OS. They had it at Xerox PARC, but Steve Jobs chose not to take that part. On the other hand, the PARC focus on replicating paper was a step backwar…

"The limitation of a single desktop was put in place to allow children to ease into the desktop metaphor." Any source for this? I dont thinkchildren were the target customers at that time.

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#57

Post by oretoz » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:13 AM UTC

thundergolfer wrote: post #40

blt wrote: post #10

As a computer science graduate student, I am always surprised by how rarely my peers seem to know or care about the history of our field. I doubt many of them would write papers about computer science history even if the incentives were better. I think it is somehow related to the power of computer science to change the human condition. Everyone is thinking about the future. Mathematicians also crave novelty, but I d…

A favourite quote, that appears on my Github profile: > Computing is pop culture. [...] Pop culture holds a disdain for history. Pop culture is all about identity and feeling like you're participating, It has nothing to do with cooperation, the past or the future—it's living in the present. I think the same is true of most people who write code for money. They have no idea where [their culture came from]. - Alan Kay…

What an amazing quote! Thanks for sharing.

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#58

Post by afarrell » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:15 AM UTC

mikewarot wrote: post #27

Unlike Medicine, many of the ideas that we had in the past were better than the commonly accepted way things are done now. Capability based security, for example was something that allowed you to run any program, with no danger to your system. It's not part of any common OS. They had it at Xerox PARC, but Steve Jobs chose not to take that part. On the other hand, the PARC focus on replicating paper was a step backwar…

When you someone performs surgery on one patient, the legacy medical impacts of that surgery are contained to at most 2 people and their immediate families. There will probably be fewer than 10 surgeries where someone might think about that -- and we don't begrudge a surgeon who doesn't.

When you add a commit to an OS, the legacy impact of that stays with the OS and must be un-done by anyone who changes it.

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#59

Post by thundergolfer » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:20 AM UTC

Mauricebranagh wrote: post #55

thundergolfer wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A favourite quote, that appears on my Github profile: > Computing is pop culture. [...] Pop culture holds a disdain for history. Pop culture is all about identity and feeling like you're participating, It has nothing to do with cooperation, the past or the future—it's living in the present. I think the same is true of most people who write code for money. They have no idea where [their culture came from]. - Alan Kay…

The problem with this blanket rejection of "pop culture" as something lesser is that its almost always deployed by "young fogey" conservatives, harkening back to so golden imperial age. And of course these sort of people don't actually have any in depth historical knowledge.

I don’t read that quote as a blanket rejection of pop culture. Not at all.

Re: Let's Not Dumb Down the History of Computer Science (2014)

#60

Post by bboreham » Thu, Jan 28, 2021, 9:24 AM UTC

svat wrote: post #47

bboreham wrote: post #39

I would submit that the “Graphics Gems” series of books does document a lot of rendering techniques in their historical context. They were written to be current for practitioners at the time, but the connections are drawn. Similarly Michael Abrash’s articles on the development of Doom et al.

Also I guess Fabien Sanglard's "Game Engine Black Books" (on Doom and Wolfenstein 3D: https://fabiensanglard.net/gebb/ ), and John Aycock's book "Retrogame Archeology: Exploring Old Computer Games". (Wonder why all these examples are from computer games…)

I suppose to Knuth’s point there is no “book of the history of graphics algorithms”. The information exists, and some people know how to find it, but we don’t choose to write the book.