From: Peter Hickman <peterhickman386@...>
Date: 2010-12-17T21:36:44+09:00
Subject: Re: Is programming art?

On 17 December 2010 11:53, John Morrice <spoon@killersmurf.com> wrote:
>> True works of art have no utility and have a final form.
>
> I'm trying to show is that the relationship between
> utility and art is not as simple as XOR.
>
> * The program makes art.
>
> * The art is useless.
>

There is a distinction between being useless and having no utility. I
content that art has no utility in that it does not have "the quality
of being of practical use" (the meaning of the word utility). That
does not mean that it is useless.

A program that does nothing or does what it is expected to do wrong (a
calculator that cannot add up) has no utility. I have a program that
generates long strings of random characters that I use for passwords,
this has utility. If at some point in the future when security is
enabled via retinal scans and passwords are no longer in use then my
program ceases to have utility.

Art of itself never had utility.

A programmer works / creates more like a painter / sculptor than an
engineer but the result of the labours is not art but something that
has utility. Painters and sculptors do not create things of utility
unless you consider using Michelangelo's David as a hat stand :)

Is art useless? That is another question and not one that I was
addressing. Given that in around 6 billion years the sun will turn
into a Red Giant and all life on Earth will be eradicated then you
could view all human endeavour as useless :(