Why aren't we all speaking LISP now?

[Alex Martelli]

"Mitchell Morris" <mitchell.morris at cingular.com> wrote in message
news:Xns909D55CDE4895beable at 30.146.28.98...
    ...
> I'd just like to start by saying "me, too" to this sentiment.

And I'll "me, three" them:-) -- with distinguos.


> In my unspeakably arrogant opinion, Computer Science should be taught and
> approached as a science, with the intent that CS grads will be prepared to
> advance the body of knowledge. If there was a degree about applying the
> research performed by CS types, it *should be* in the engineering school.
> That is, there *should be* a Software Engineering program, which would
> teach how to apply the concepts of CS to building actual things.

Yep, and, to make more explicit the application of the analogy you
offer later wrt material science vs mechanical engineering, of course
one or more CS courses should be mandatory for engineers in related
discipline (not _just_ software).  However, separation is typically
not so clear for disciplines undergoing periods of rapid evolution,
and particularly nascent ones -- and, with just a few dozen years,
CS definitely is one.

Look at some of the pioneers and _their_ majors: Wirth, electrical
engineering; Meyer, engineering (unspecified); Dijkstra, theoretical
physics; Backus, McCarthy, Knuth, mathematics; Naur, astronomy...

Throughout the history of astronomy, for example, astronomers have
had to "get their hands dirty" and perform such tasks as advancing
the state of _engineering_ in such fields as optics, because they
couldn't get good-enough tools by waiting.  It's only fitting then
that a major discovery in astronomy (thermal background radiation)
was due to some electric engineers looking for unexplainable noise
still affecting their new super-duper noise-free radio receiver.

If this is what's still happening in astronomy after all these
centuries, why should be be surprised to see it happening in
such a new science (and engineering discipline) as that about
computers?  This doesn't mean it's not a good idea to offer
separate courses in the _science_ and _engineering_ sides of
things, but it does prompt for flexibility rather than rigid
separation between the two.  Ideally, I'd like to see a lot of
flexibility about mixing courses from the two schools, for
example -- sometimes administratively hard to arrange if the
schools are kept under different branches, depending on the
University (I'm told that around here a Medicine major wanting
to take a couple of Biology courses or vice versa is unlikely
to manage to get that approved -- different schools, faculties
that don't even talk to each other... and similarly for Chemistry
vs Chemical Engineering, etc).


> [rant about people calling themselves Engineers (even Software ones)
> without having taken the FE exam first elided]

I assume a "FE exam" is a professional qualification test?

We have such things (state-sponsored, too, and thus with
force of law behind them), but, in the SW field at least,
they're pretty worthless -- I've taken mine, many years
ago, "just in case" (but I had been working as an engineer
for years already, and nobody cared exactly what pieces of
paper I had or lacked), but then didn't bother to pay the
yearly dues (no renewed examinations necessary, as long as
one keeps forking out the yearly sums:-) to remain a member
in good standing -- the dues are aimed at civil engineers
&c, for whom being a member in good standing IS a prereq
for being able to legally sign a building's blueprints &c,
and so they're pretty steep for those to whom the "piece of
paper" is purely ornamental and makes no difference to their
status or income opportunities:-).

Still, legally, I suspect I can't call myself an "engineer"
here in Italy, until and unless I pay 15+ years' worth of
back dues...:-).  Sometimes I think the total disregard for
the laws, that is so characteristic of Italians, is pretty
easy to explain if you see how our laws sometimes are!-)


Alex