From: Daniel Carrera <dcarrera@...>
Date: 2003-01-13T04:04:27+09:00
Subject: Re: Ruby advocacy in sigs

On Mon, 13 Jan 2003, Tom Sawyer wrote:

> don't mistake the pudding for the spoon.

That's an interesting expression.  What does that mean?

> why do you think a conversing computer would be limited in its
> expressiveness?
> does not your conversations with fellow mathmaticians emcompass the
> language of Math?

I see your point, but actually that is not exactly correct.

When I talk about math with my colleagues I have to use the blackboard to
convey most of the imformation.  Though there are spoken words for what I
want to say, it is much harder to convery the message through them than
through the actual mathematical symbols.

My opinion that it'd be hard to program by speech comes from my experience
that it's hard to express math in speech.

The topic of languages is very interesting.  With a language goes a way
of thinking about the world which cannot always be translated to another
language.  I have found that it's easier to *think* some things in English
and others in Spanish.  So, in my thought process I actually alternate
between the two (with the occasional stroll into abstract math).

Perhaps some day computer languages will be as rich as English, Spanish
and Math.

Cheers,
Daniel Carrera
Graduate Teaching Assistant.  Math Dept.
University of Maryland.  (301) 405-5137