From: Tom Armitage <tom.armitage@...>
Date: 2006-10-16T23:35:28+09:00
Subject: Re: What is the reason for this syntax?

On 16/10/06, Kevin Olemoh <darkintent@gmail.com> wrote:
> Explain to me how diversity is actually helping people in this respect?

So: I think it's time, given we're having a linguistic war, to discuss
the old chestnut that is the (moderately controversial) Sapir-Whorf
hypothesis:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapir-Whorf_hypothesis

In a nutshell: the things you do, the ways you solve problem, the
cultures that emerge, are entirely dependent on what can/cannot be
expressed within the language of that culture.

This theory is, as the page points out, not untrue, but the hypothesis
itself is disputed in varying ways. But it's an interesting way to
think, especially about programming.

When you don't have open classes like Ruby does, you don't approach a
problem involving String maniuplation by opening up String and
extending or altering its methods. There's a vast amount in Lisp that
just doesn't make sense as a solution in other languages, because of
the way Lisp handles data (as code). The functional languages make you
think in an entirely different way to the procedural ones.

My point is: diversity of language leads to diversity of culture and
diversity of thought.

It doesn't help, Kevin, that you confuse dialect and language.
Different Linux distros are more like dialects. It's frustrating they
don't work... but, remember, dialect can evolve into language in its
own right - and many dialect scholars would argue that the dialect
they specialise in essentially _is_ a language in its own right. Given
that... that's WHY Debian behaves differently to SUSE. They cater for
different ways of thinking.

Let's say it again: ways of thinking. That's what diversity of
expression is about. Rather than coming to a culture and trying to
make it "more like yours", why not embrace it for a while?

Right now, you're coming over like someone wanting to speak English
with French grammar. That's never going to work.

Of course, if you think that everyone thinking and expressing
themselves the same way is a *good* thing, then all I can say is that
you're much mistaken, as anyone who's tried to forcibly restrict use
of languages within a state.