> I guess I had a somewhat emotional reaction to the criticism...
I agree wtith the rest of your post there.
> I think our abstractions let us communicate intention in a way that computers are far far away from achieving.
>
> Show a webpage with "identify all the traffic lights" to a child and, it might take a little while (especially if they can't read!) but the human will build up abstraction and leverage prior knowledge and solve the problem.
Ah. I don't measure progress using computers relative to the human brain. So when I say programmers are using bad abstractions, I am not envious of human pattern recognition etc. at all. Likewise natural language abstractions are messy and culturally loaded and so much more I don't want to get into.
When I say abstractions I am just talking about the rigid formal ones we program.
I think the field is too focused on A.I. stuff because of old romantic notions about human vs computer, piss poor education making programming knowledge scarce, and general laziness among the non-technical powers that be about defining the requirements. I don't think should be the main thread of how we use computers in society.
I agree wtith the rest of your post there.
> I think our abstractions let us communicate intention in a way that computers are far far away from achieving. > > Show a webpage with "identify all the traffic lights" to a child and, it might take a little while (especially if they can't read!) but the human will build up abstraction and leverage prior knowledge and solve the problem.
Ah. I don't measure progress using computers relative to the human brain. So when I say programmers are using bad abstractions, I am not envious of human pattern recognition etc. at all. Likewise natural language abstractions are messy and culturally loaded and so much more I don't want to get into.
When I say abstractions I am just talking about the rigid formal ones we program.
I think the field is too focused on A.I. stuff because of old romantic notions about human vs computer, piss poor education making programming knowledge scarce, and general laziness among the non-technical powers that be about defining the requirements. I don't think should be the main thread of how we use computers in society.