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Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

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Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#91

Post by makerdiety »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #13

I teach the systems class at Montana State, where we go from transistors up to a real computing system, and I have students that don't understand what a file system really is when they start my class I agree that blow is wrong on some details, but I really think we need to be thinking hard around a NAND-to-Tetris style education that starts in high school for our technical students. I use "outdated" models like Littl…

The problem is, your best minds, whom you regard as being "technical," ironically simply don't have the pedagogical and epistemological axioms needed for possessing the sensibility that can conceptualize and eventually abstract away the fundamental principles of the technology civilization presently enjoys. Not just young students, but so too is lacking the experts, leaders, teachers, and supposedly prolific and employed engineers living within the cosmopolitan nationalist tribal world-system that is none other than globalist liberal democracy. In much more simple words, the communal program of regressing education toward the mean where the average human can apprehend the secret physics of the universe always runs into the barrier where an average disposition just can't cut it in the progression of science that isn't mundane or trivial. You said you laugh at the idea of expecting the children of your community to understand and leverage an understanding of things like Intel's latest microprocessors and a web browser front-end framework like Angular? Why, that's the bare minimum needed for surviving the complex world that is arriving on the scene.

Humans are physiologically incapable of doing or understanding anything significant. They inflate their status to be stuff like anything even remotely central to the universe, which is the definition of the anthropocentric. While in actuality reality can and will go on without humanity. Regardless of how life gets falsified, simplified, and dumbed down for the slow kids of the universe that is humanist society. As if the constant string of inconsistencies in quantum physics wasn't proof enough of the reliable ineffectiveness of mathematics as well as science in achieving knowledge.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#92

Post by sampullman »

scarface_74 wrote: post #81
ninetyninenine wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No. Taiwan and Korea are on par for design.

Taiwan doesn’t “design” any leading edge chip they manufacture them. Where are the great chios from Korea? The top Android phones are four years behind iPhones as far as performance - including those from Samsung

Don't discount MediaTek, and four years is an exaggeration.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#93

Post by TheMode »

sarchertech wrote: post #90
TheMode wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally do not like how his solution boils down to "just learn more" which may be true at an individual level, but not as the general solution to awful software. You will never be able to force developers worldwide to start writing everything in C/Assembly, or even to care beyond "it performs fine on my machine". Individuals can have fun micro-optimizing their application, but overall, we have the app we have be…

Watch some of the intros to his performance aware programming videos. He doesn’t want everyone to use C or Assembly. He also doesn’t want everyone micro-optimizing things. >compromises we find somewhat acceptable His entire point is that most developers aren’t actually aware of the compromises they are making. Which is why he calls it “performance aware programming” and not performance first programming.

I have actually watched many of his videos, as an individual I very much like his advices. What I am saying however is that this has nothing to do whatsoever with improving software at scale.

But my point still stands, Casey focuses solely on the cultural aspect but completely ignore the technical one. He says that developers became lazy/uninformed, but why did that happen? Why would anything he currently say solve it?

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#94

Post by mouse_ »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #13

I teach the systems class at Montana State, where we go from transistors up to a real computing system, and I have students that don't understand what a file system really is when they start my class I agree that blow is wrong on some details, but I really think we need to be thinking hard around a NAND-to-Tetris style education that starts in high school for our technical students. I use "outdated" models like Littl…

Thanks for your post. I'm always on the hunt for this sort of gritty educational material. MIT's NAND-to-Tetris first principles book seems right up my alley.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#95

Post by raincole »

rglover wrote: post #74
Swizec wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They think that React is itself what browsers render My kingdom for native JSX in the browser. That would be awesome . Something similar to how we have WebGL and Canvas, but for pure JavaScript UI without the extra step of DOM reconciliation. There’s a small (and growing) cohort of people working on rendering React Native directly on canvas or webgl (I think). Supposedly gives you super smooth UX, but I haven’t kno…

The lengths that some JS developers go to avoid writing HTML is unbelievable. JSX is one of those technologies that was clever for what it was, but should have never caught on. Adding another layer of abstraction on top of JSX is the type of behavior at the root of the civilizational collapse argument. Just because you can doesn't mean you should .

I don't think it's a very fair criticism. Of all the abstractions over HTML, JSX is the only one that forces you to learn HTML itself. So the reason why JS programmers chose JSX isn't that they refuse to write HTML.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#96

Post by jibal »

dostick wrote: post #2

It appears that author is from that newer generation, and completely misses points because he just don’t know. Ironically the article is an example of what Blow was talking about. similar happens if I talk about how Figma is destroying the design world on unprecedented scale by normalising bad UX, UI and product management found in Figma itself, and get responses from younger designers that everything is great, compl…

"It appears that author is from that newer generation"

No it doesn't. Nothing else you wrote here is true either.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#97

Post by mp05 »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #13

I teach the systems class at Montana State, where we go from transistors up to a real computing system, and I have students that don't understand what a file system really is when they start my class I agree that blow is wrong on some details, but I really think we need to be thinking hard around a NAND-to-Tetris style education that starts in high school for our technical students. I use "outdated" models like Littl…

> I teach the systems class at Montana State, where we go from transistors up to a real computing system, and I have students that don't understand what a file system really is when they start my class

Admittedly I am old grouch, but I stopped having any expectations of the current generation of "college kids".

Incidentally, I'm at Montana State getting a master's in IE, and I deal daily with this one PhD student who has demonstrated an inability to perform a simple partial derivative, which you'd think is a pretty useful skill given the subject matter. Hell, last semester in a 400-level math course, one of the students didn't understand how to add two matrices, I kid you not. It is odd that a senior in CS wouldn't know what a file system is, but that seems rather quaint compared to some of the wild bullshit I've encountered here.

My first stint in university in the 2000s felt a lot different than this, and it's a bit depressing. But man, I feel just great about my prospects in the job market next spring.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#98

Post by seanmcdirmid »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #13

I teach the systems class at Montana State, where we go from transistors up to a real computing system, and I have students that don't understand what a file system really is when they start my class I agree that blow is wrong on some details, but I really think we need to be thinking hard around a NAND-to-Tetris style education that starts in high school for our technical students. I use "outdated" models like Littl…

Actual old fashioned file systems aren’t really in use anymore, and the computerized versions hide the details, you don’t even get a command prompt on an iPad. I’m pretty sure my 8 year old has no clue what a file system is yet (I learned at about 7 when my dad brought home an Osborne with pre-DOS CPM to play around with). Computers don’t require you to know that stuff anymore just to use apps and save/get files.

Re: Is software abstraction killing civilization? (2021)

#100

Post by gmueckl »

rglover wrote: post #74
Swizec wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They think that React is itself what browsers render My kingdom for native JSX in the browser. That would be awesome . Something similar to how we have WebGL and Canvas, but for pure JavaScript UI without the extra step of DOM reconciliation. There’s a small (and growing) cohort of people working on rendering React Native directly on canvas or webgl (I think). Supposedly gives you super smooth UX, but I haven’t kno…

The lengths that some JS developers go to avoid writing HTML is unbelievable. JSX is one of those technologies that was clever for what it was, but should have never caught on. Adding another layer of abstraction on top of JSX is the type of behavior at the root of the civilizational collapse argument. Just because you can doesn't mean you should .

Just because you can doesn't mean you should in production.

If someone want to build horrific abominations in rheur spare time at home, I won't stop them. They might become better engineers through that experience. But don't come to me suggesting actually using one of these horrors.

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