I like Dijkstra's quote: "The question of whether machines can think is about as relevant as the question of whether submarines can swim."
Relevant to what exactly?
The quote claims it's irrelevant, not relevant (to something).
Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
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Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#22I like Dijkstra's quote: "The question of whether machines can think is about as relevant as the question of whether submarines can swim."
Relevant to what exactly?
He's a computer scientist speaking to other computer scientists, so I'd say he's talking about relevancy to computer science.
But I think perhaps you've missed his subtle use of language.
Fish swim, obviously. What submarines do in water isn't usually described a swimming.
That's a bit odd in when you think about it as in both cases the objective is to get from A to B, while in the water. In fact if you look at only the outcomes, what fish and submarines do when swimming looks almost identical. They move (or perhaps be stationary in a current), they tend to be efficient about it, they try to not make a lot of noise, they even use very similar mechanisms to move vertically.
Despite that it almost seems that to swim you have to be fish, or a sea snake, or a blue bottle or water bug - but not a submarine. And going by the discussions here to think you have to be a human, or a dog, or just about anything but a computer. And that's true no matter how closely a computer can emulate tasks we say require thinking in a human.
A conclusion you might draw then is whether a submarine swims deciding belongs in the domain of linguistics, not computer science. And he's saying that's true for whether computers "think" too.
Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
The whole structured programming practically birthed the industry, so it’s hard to say he has less direct impact in the industry though.
It was controversial at the time. Dijkstra advocated "single entry, single exit" for each control block. Programs should be composed of such blocks. Makes for very neat flowcharts. Good for entry and exit conditions. Single entry wasn't that controversial. Single exit, though, means no "break", or "continue" for loops, and no early returns from functions. This forces a rather convoluted style. Try writing a loop of t…
> Single exit, though, means no "break", or "continue" for loops, and no early returns from functions.
Sounds like pretty standard functional programming a la Standard ML or Haskell, or am I missing something?
Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#24Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#25I recently realized, after talking to a friend of mine who studied Dijkstra's works, that for as much as he was interested in writing correct programs his "Structured Programming" approach makes absolutely zero guarantees on correctess or even verifiability. A program written in a structured way is not inherently more correct nor easier to automatically check for bugs.
> his "Structured Programming" approach makes absolutely zero guarantees on correctess or even verifiability
That was never the claim. The claim was humans using "Structured programming" produced code with less bugs than humans using other methods. "Humans" being the key word here, a compiler will happily produce perfect programs every time just using goto's (because there is no choice in assembler). But when humans use goto's it's usually a disaster.
History has vindicated him big time. Many modern languages don't have goto's, precisely for this reason.
Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#26I like Dijkstra's quote: "The question of whether machines can think is about as relevant as the question of whether submarines can swim."
Maybe I'm stupid, but does he mean that as long as the task at hand is solved it doesn't matter how we categorize it. In the submarine case it would be "move through water", for example. Or is it deeper than that?
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Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
Relevant to what exactly?
He's a computer scientist speaking to other computer scientists, so I'd say he's talking about relevancy to computer science. But I think perhaps you've missed his subtle use of language. Fish swim, obviously. What submarines do in water isn't usually described a swimming. That's a bit odd in when you think about it as in both cases the objective is to get from A to B, while in the water. In fact if you look at only…
See what's strange here is that we would call a dancing robot "dancing", and not think twice about it.
Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#28Earlier quoted context omitted.
It was controversial at the time. Dijkstra advocated "single entry, single exit" for each control block. Programs should be composed of such blocks. Makes for very neat flowcharts. Good for entry and exit conditions. Single entry wasn't that controversial. Single exit, though, means no "break", or "continue" for loops, and no early returns from functions. This forces a rather convoluted style. Try writing a loop of t…
> Single exit, though, means no "break", or "continue" for loops, and no early returns from functions. Sounds like pretty standard functional programming a la Standard ML or Haskell, or am I missing something?
> a rather convoluted style
It may be standard for them, but it's why functional languages are niche while C, C++, C#, Java, JavaScript and Python dominate.
Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
He's a computer scientist speaking to other computer scientists, so I'd say he's talking about relevancy to computer science. But I think perhaps you've missed his subtle use of language. Fish swim, obviously. What submarines do in water isn't usually described a swimming. That's a bit odd in when you think about it as in both cases the objective is to get from A to B, while in the water. In fact if you look at only…
See what's strange here is that we would call a dancing robot "dancing", and not think twice about it.
Because robots are built to perform the illusion of being animal-like, and often human-like more specifically.
So there's a theatrical game being played when interacting with these devices that makes them valuable to the people playing that game.
More generally, when the adtech companies selling the current round of AI do the same, without any irony, it's usually a mixture of charlatanism, selling and legal avoidance.
(Eg., that "ChatGPT wrote X" is a kind of theatrical game wherein OpenAI are the material beneficiaries, and most others, are the loosers).
Re: Edsger Dijkstra carried computer science on his shoulders (2020)
#30Dijkstra is a wonderful source of memorable quotes and hot takes from the early days of software. A sampling: > “The competent programmer is fully aware of the limited size of his own skull. He therefore approaches his task with full humility, and avoids clever tricks like the plague.” (Dijkstra, 1972) > “The use of COBOL cripples the mind; its teaching should, therefore, be regarded as a criminal offense.” (Dijkstra…
whats wrong with object oriented programming?