From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,INVALID_MSGID autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 109fba,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid109fba,public X-Google-Thread: 1014db,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid1014db,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,1042f393323e22da X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public From: Craig Franck Subject: Re: Any research putting c above ada? Date: 1997/05/03 Message-ID: <5kfutd$g0p@mtinsc05.worldnet.att.net>#1/1 X-Deja-AN: 239142569 References: <5ih6i9$oct$1@waldorf.csc.calpoly.edu> <5k60au$gig@bcrkh13.bnr.ca> <5kb91p$1bc@bcrkh13.bnr.ca> Organization: AT&T WorldNet Services Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.ada Date: 1997-05-03T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: jsa@alexandria (Jon S Anthony) wrote: > >In article <5kb91p$1bc@bcrkh13.bnr.ca> kaz@vision.crest.nt.com (Kaz Kylheku) writes: > >> Some aspects of CS have a scientific flavor; there is a fair degree >> of empiricism. Whenever you prototype some software, or profile the >> performance of a program, you are doing an experiment that is not >> unlike a scientific experiment. You > >That's only a part of the story. In CS you are dealing with >intentional artifacts and IMO that alone snuffs the "science" part. >As I say, others will disagree... Well, it is no longer "Natural Science". If you think of science as generalizing through observation and application of specific methods then, as Kaz said, it only has a scientic "flavor". I think the best analogy is one of construction: you are a computer engineer, a technologist who builds things and constructs models. The people who build those billion dollar chip factories rely on semiconductor physicists who would be much more of a scientist than the fellow writing packages in VHDL. I think you need to distinguish software engineering from the science behind the technology. Lumping it all into "CS" is more of a convience than anythings else; you have one term for everything at the expense of being imprecise. When you lump in cost management and risk assessment quite often it seems like it has as much to do with actually writing code as your personnel manager keeping track of how many vacation days you have left. -- Craig clfranck@worldnet.att.net Manchester, NH All evolution in thought and conduct must at first appear as heresy and misconduct. -- George Bernard Shaw