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=-0.3 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00, REPLYTO_WITHOUT_TO_CC autolearn=no autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 107f24,626a0a064b320310 X-Google-Attributes: gid107f24,public X-Google-Thread: 103d24,626a0a064b320310 X-Google-Attributes: gid103d24,public X-Google-Thread: 10259a,626a0a064b320310 X-Google-Attributes: gid10259a,public X-Google-Thread: 103376,ea8ea502d35ca2ce X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-Thread: f4fd2,626a0a064b320310 X-Google-Attributes: gidf4fd2,public X-Google-Thread: 114809,626a0a064b320310 X-Google-Attributes: gid114809,public X-Google-Thread: 1164ba,626a0a064b320310 X-Google-Attributes: gid1164ba,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2001-05-09 21:00:24 PST Path: newsfeed.google.com!sn-xit-02!supernews.com!news.gv.tsc.tdk.com!news.iac.net!news-out.cwix.com!newsfeed.cwix.com!news.maxwell.syr.edu!arclight.uoregon.edu!newsfeed.ksu.edu!nntp.ksu.edu!news.okstate.edu!dvdeug From: dvdeug@x8b4e53cd.dhcp.okstate.edu (David Starner) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada,comp.lang.lisp,comp.lang.smalltalk,comp.lang.basic,comp.lang.functional,comp.lang.scheme,comp.lang.perl Subject: Re: Beginner's Language? Date: 10 May 2001 00:01:01 GMT Organization: Oklahoma State University Message-ID: <9dclnt$9ic1@news.cis.okstate.edu> References: <9cukad$nn68@news-dxb> <9d6b6e$1bt$1@nh.pace.co.uk> <87snihxiwc.fsf@frown.here> <9dbi83$sji$1@nh.pace.co.uk> <87heyu7cqd.fsf@frown.here> <9dc20p$hh15e$1@ID-37382.news.dfncis.de> Reply-To: dstarner98@aasaa.ofe.org NNTP-Posting-Host: x8b4e555d.dhcp.okstate.edu User-Agent: slrn/0.9.7.0 (Linux) Xref: newsfeed.google.com comp.lang.ada:7424 comp.lang.lisp:9896 comp.lang.smalltalk:9657 comp.lang.functional:5601 comp.lang.scheme:3750 comp.lang.perl:2752 Date: 2001-05-10T00:01:01+00:00 List-Id: On Wed, 09 May 2001 18:01:10 -0500, Sashank Varma wrote: > can you provide some evidence that: > > (1) any standard general-purpose programming languages resemble natural > language at all, that there is some metric of natural language-ness > by which they can be ordered, and that wirth-style languages score > higer on this metric than lisp? > > (2) the degree to which a programming language resembles natural > language predicts the ease with which it will be learned? Tell me what !bbz#,^az@bz, does. Then tell me what OPEN FILE ARGUMENT 2 AS 2 BEGIN LOOP LOAD FILE ARGUMENT 1 INTO BUFFER COPY BUFFER TO 2 FINISH LOOP does. If I came upon the first, I would give up. The second, anyone can probably get some idea of basically what it's doing. For a new student, knowing that they aren't totally lost can be a huge confidence builder. As for lisp itself, just from the name, what does defun or cadar do? What do FUNCTION, PROCEDURE and BEGIN do? I've seen 2 + 2 since the first days of school. Why (+ 2 2)? Learning a new vocabulary, a new equation syntax is not what you want to be teaching when you have so much else to teach. > (if you thinking i'm picking nits, note that i've granted you the > implicit assumption that there is a singular quality shared by all > natural languages, a chomsky-esque universal grammar perhaps, that i > could have also questioned.) That's a theoritical assumption. How about "The vast majority of the people who are going to be learning computer programming know an Indo-European language, Russian, Chinese or Japanese." > there are many formal notations, and while one pressure on the form > of notations may be resemblance to natural language, there are others > of greater importance (e.g., minimizing the difficulty of performing > certain operations). No, that's not of greater importance. It is, in fact, irrelevant for any reasonable language. The goal is teaching people to program, not helping experianced programmers hack up scripts or researchers write up quicker chess programs. If something is difficult in your chosen language, you put that off until a latter class, possibly even in a more suitable language. -- David Starner - dstarner98@aasaa.ofe.org Pointless website: http://dvdeug.dhis.org "I don't care if Bill personally has my name and reads my email and laughs at me. In fact, I'd be rather honored." - Joseph_Greg