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A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

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Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, certainly the procedure for going to the bathroom is a bit different in modern times[1], and what parts of the Old Testament is a matter of debate between branches of Christians. Heck, the english translation of "thou shalt not (murder|kill)" is a bit of a thing. By the time you get out of bible school and listen to the sermons, you have gone through the whole bible[2]. I just found it very tone deaf to open wi…

the Catholic church did a bit of pruning too, in the 3rd century AD. Council of Nicea

The Council of Nicea didn't deal with bible canon - that was made up for "The Da Vinci Code". Various religious sites debunked that one during the books and movie introductions.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is really hard to understate the volume of words and man-millenia spent reading and writing about these books. So much brain power spent on scriptures which are, in the light of current knowledge… improbable to say the least. Sounds like a huge waste of effort, really. Take the Genesis, for instance. Currently, only creationist crackpots actually believe it. It's more of a symbol. It seems however that some cent…

I think if you saw the actual content of these writings you'd be surprised how very little of it has anything to do with whatever it is you imagine it to. The bulk of the Jewish literature is about ethics. The historicity of a story is irrelevant to the ethical questions it raises, and Jewish analysis regards the Bible as primarily a source of questions. Judaism is not a religion of creed, so Jews are not required to…

> Jews are not required to hold any particular beliefs.

I don't believe you. More specifically, I don't believe that the majority of people that regularly visit the synagogue think they don't have to hold any particular belief to stay Jew. I believe even less that the majority of Jews who cease to believe in God continue to call themselves religious.

> The mistakes are not only admitted, they are recorded in the book itself.

Oh. I didn't know the book itself was evidence of the waste of effort I mentioned. Seriously, remove the mistakes already, don't put an erratum 357 pages later.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#73
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It is really hard to understate the volume of words and man-millenia spent reading and writing about these books. So much brain power spent on scriptures which are, in the light of current knowledge… improbable to say the least. Sounds like a huge waste of effort, really. Take the Genesis, for instance. Currently, only creationist crackpots actually believe it. It's more of a symbol. It seems however that some cent…

Loosely, no. Sorry. :-/ Please don't take hardcore fundamentalist strictly-literalist narratives as the accepted "way" of Christianity. Genesis was regarded as metaphorical around ~400AD, iirc (Augustine). Pretty sure the modern literalist movement is a post-1850 phenomenon. I don't get into the creation story discussions, it is entirely irrelevant in many ways to me. Waste of our time, IMO. Judaism in particular is…

> Please don't take hardcore fundamentalist strictly-literalist narratives as the accepted "way" of Christianity.

I called them "creationist crackpots" for a reason. What I don't get, is why what shouldn't be interpreted literally, isn't simply stricken from the canon. I mean, what is the point of writing about a world created in seven days (oops, six), if we know it wasn't? Sabbath?

> Genesis was regarded as metaphorical around ~400AD, iirc (Augustine).

That's sooner than I expected. Which leaves us around 6 centuries to amend the book.

> Judaism in particular is aggressive about doubt and questioning.

Even if they aggressively show interest in doubt and questioning, I doubt it's for actually doubting an questioning, like, to the point of having some members realizing their religion is probably wrong after all. Here's a related example, from http://lesswrong.com/lw/ib/the_proper_use_of_doubt/

"""

Once, when I was holding forth upon the Way[1], I remarked upon how most organized belief systems exist to flee from doubt. A listener replied to me that the Jesuits must be immune from this criticism, because they practice organized doubt: their novices, he said, are told to doubt Christianity; doubt the existence of God; doubt if their calling is real; doubt that they are suitable for perpetual vows of chastity and poverty. And I said: Ah, but they're supposed to overcome these doubts, right? He said: No, they are to doubt that perhaps their doubts may grow and become stronger.

[1]: http://yudkowsky.net/virtues/

"""

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#74
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Loosely, no. Sorry. :-/ Please don't take hardcore fundamentalist strictly-literalist narratives as the accepted "way" of Christianity. Genesis was regarded as metaphorical around ~400AD, iirc (Augustine). Pretty sure the modern literalist movement is a post-1850 phenomenon. I don't get into the creation story discussions, it is entirely irrelevant in many ways to me. Waste of our time, IMO. Judaism in particular is…

> Please don't take hardcore fundamentalist strictly-literalist narratives as the accepted "way" of Christianity. I called them "creationist crackpots" for a reason. What I don't get, is why what shouldn't be interpreted literally, isn't simply stricken from the canon. I mean, what is the point of writing about a world created in seven days (oops, six), if we know it wasn't? Sabbath? > Genesis was regarded as metapho…

Could it be that "creationist crackpots" is what triggered the downvotes above?

If not, feedback about I did wrong would be most welcome.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#75
post #6

I am not sure it is true that comp.lang.lisp barely tolerates newbies. I have posted there on several occasions and when I say something wrong, I am politely corrected. I have seen a lot of less experienced programmers come there, ask an obviously beginner question, and get helpful answers. Reading through the past few days of posts, I can see a few beginner questions which all received helpful answers. The problem i…

It has been absolutely years, but I recall they didn't like homework problems. This made it really difficult to ask newb questions.

homework problems are different than newbie problems..

a homework problem is a problem you're charged with solving so as to reinforce elements and critical thinking from the chapter or segment of teaching that you experienced before the problem. Very few homework problems are given that cannot be solved by the user, if they paid attention to the work. There is a very thin line between someone trying to crowd-source their homework to a programming forum, and actually asking for help. This can usually be determined by how the question is asked.

Example: "How do I write this..?" is not as respectable a question as "I am writing this, i'm this far and I ran into this problem, can anyone help me to understand my problem?"

a newbie problem is a problem generated through normal use of a language to achieve a goal, in which the language user ( the newbie ) lacks the personal experience to conquer some goal post standing between him and his reason for writing what he/she's writing.

Example : "I'm coming from such and such a language where we can do this... ... will this ... work the same in CL?" or "This piece of code behaves in this way ... can anyone help me work through as to why it does this?"

The problem (that people have) with the lisp community is that they tend to be highly sensitive in regards to hand-holding, and can usually sniff out homework problems with relative ease.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think if you saw the actual content of these writings you'd be surprised how very little of it has anything to do with whatever it is you imagine it to. The bulk of the Jewish literature is about ethics. The historicity of a story is irrelevant to the ethical questions it raises, and Jewish analysis regards the Bible as primarily a source of questions. Judaism is not a religion of creed, so Jews are not required to…

> Jews are not required to hold any particular beliefs. I don't believe you. More specifically, I don't believe that the majority of people that regularly visit the synagogue think they don't have to hold any particular belief to stay Jew. I believe even less that the majority of Jews who cease to believe in God continue to call themselves religious. > The mistakes are not only admitted, they are recorded in the book…

Your disbelief stems from your fundamental lack of understanding of what you're talking about. You imagine that every religion is basically fundamentalist Protestantism. Your loss, I suppose.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Jews are not required to hold any particular beliefs. I don't believe you. More specifically, I don't believe that the majority of people that regularly visit the synagogue think they don't have to hold any particular belief to stay Jew. I believe even less that the majority of Jews who cease to believe in God continue to call themselves religious. > The mistakes are not only admitted, they are recorded in the book…

Your disbelief stems from your fundamental lack of understanding of what you're talking about. You imagine that every religion is basically fundamentalist Protestantism. Your loss, I suppose.

Actually, I was raised in a lukewarm catholic environment, in France. There was no "coming out" as an atheist for me, it was quite… ordinary. My rejection of relativism spurred more heated discussions that my rejection of God, actually.

Anyway, every catholic I met believe in God and in the Immaculate Conception. And I think they also believed it was an important, if not fundamental, part of being catholic. Not to mention all the rituals that mention God and Jesus all over the place.

Which is why I cannot fathom a religion that does not at least strongly encourages its members to believe in something supernatural.

Seriously, you're tempting me to send a e-mail to Robert Aummann¹, and ask him about that. Or read Eliezer Yudkowsky about his childhood. Or just read the wikipedia². Let's see… Oh the chief reason why supernatural belief isn't required is because there's no recognized central authority… I bet however that most Rabbi strongly encourage a belief in something supernatural. If not directly, at least through the rituals they organize.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Aumann

[2]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_principles_of_faith

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#78
post #39

Is this not just another point in a decades long quest to save LISP? Maybe LISP doesn't need saved? Maybe it's okay that a language isn't popular? Maybe It's okay that a language isn't hip? Maybe it's okay if a language doesn't have the latest gee wiz social status? The fact that people keep trying to save LISP every 4 or 5 years could mean it's perfectly fine how it is. I don't see people trying to save the COBOL, o…

> FORTRAN It's spelled Fortran since the 1992 standard, which was a huge improvement, and now since the 2003 and 2008 standards, Fortran is a pretty decent language. But a funny thought occurred to me: year 1992 is now 21 years ago, but ignorance of the difference between FORTRAN 77 and modern Fortran continues strong. In next 5 year or so we'll start to get Fortran-ignorant comments from people who are younger than…

I'm embarrassed to say that I actually know this, but it's so ingrained to type it in caps. I even did it twice in this thread.

It was an interesting exercise in college when I took a class on numerical methods and some programs where in "old" style while other were in "new" style. It made the non-programmers go bonkers.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#79
post #46
post #9

As someone who learned a little Lisp in the last few years, I think there is a good collection of books available for the newbie who wants to learn. For Common Lisp, Land of Lisp , Practical Common Lisp , and Ansi Common Lisp all seem good enough to get hacking quickly. Thinking about community effects, I'm not as convinced a community represents a gating factor for hackers. I attend the occasional Clojure meetup (an…

Hi tom_b, I'm one of the co-organizers of the NYC Clojure meetup. I don't know if that's the one you attend, but I'm definitely interested in any specific ideas you might have for better introductions and ice breakers.

Thanks for organizing a Clojure meetup, it is much appreciated.

My only recommendations are quite generic - for smaller meetups, make sure a group introduction is on the agenda and actually happens. Might be nice if there were easy ways to become more active in the group, but this is hard for the meetup/talk format.

I'm definitely not being critical though - I feel lucky enough to have a Clojure meetup happen in my general area. Mostly it falls back on me, as an interested-in-the-community hacker to find a way actually be social and integrate myself into that group.

Re: A Personal Lisp Crisis (2012)

#80

I love Clojure and I think it's the first Lisp to take the language family out of "cons cell and parenthesis hell". My personal opinion is that Clojure with the following changes would take over much of the Lisp space: - Rewrite most of Clojure in Clojure (which has been talked about since the beginning, really) to find the "small core". Thankfully ClojureScript has helped hasten the CiC movement. - Base FFI and code…

I doubt Rich Hickey is interested in those few remaining CL stalwarts that won't come over because he doesn't open up the reader. It's just a non issue.
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