If we can dispel the delusion that learning about computers should be an activity of fiddling with array indexes and worrying whether X is an integer or a real number, we can begin to focus on programming as a source of ideas.
Hal AbelsonRead
First, we want to establish the idea that a computer language is not just a way of getting a computer to perform operations but rather that it is a novel formal medium for expressing ideas about methodology. Thus, programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally for machines to execute.
Interpretation
What this quote means
A computer language serves as a means for humans to communicate complex ideas, not merely as a tool for machines.
Hal Abelson emphasizes that computer programming goes beyond instructing machines; it is fundamentally about communicating and expressing methodologies and ideas in a way that is understandable for humans. This perspective encourages programmers to prioritize clarity and readability in their code, as it is meant for human comprehension first and machine execution second.
Themes
ProgrammingCommunicationReadabilityMethodologyIdeas
In practice
Example use cases
In a tech conference discussing best coding practices.
More from Hal Abelson
All quotes →Similar quotes
I don't know whether computers are improving the style of play, I know they are changing it. Chess has become a different game, one could say that computers have changed the world of chess. That is pretty clear.
Vladimir KramnikRead
The danger of the Internet is cocooning with the like-minded online - of sending an email or Twitter and confusing that with action - while the real corporate and military and government centers of power go right on.
Gloria SteinemRead
Computers are still technology because we are still wrestling with it: it's still being invented; we're still trying to work out how it works. There's a world of game interaction to come that you or I wouldn't recognise. It's time for the machines to disappear. The computer's got to disappear into all of the things we use.
Douglas AdamsRead
There were a lot of naysayers over the years. People would say, 'Why are we spending all of this money? Are you sure this cellular thing will turn out to be something?'
Martin CooperRead
The only reason we don't notice how absolutely interwoven our thinking processes have become with older technologies - pencils, paper, electric light, penicillin, fire - is that they're old, so we've ceased to notice their effects.
Clive ThompsonRead
We continue to have this illusion that things outside of us aren't driving what we think and believe, when in fact so much of what we spend our attention on is driven by decisions of thousands of engineers and product designers.
Tristan HarrisRead