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: T Wheeley Subject: Re: Any research putting c above ada? Date: 1997/05/14 Message-ID: #1/1 X-Deja-AN: 241545199 Sender: tw104@york.ac.uk References: <5ih6i9$oct$1@waldorf.csc.calpoly.edu><33674E4C.446B@cca.rockwell.com> <5k88b3$340@bcrkh13.bnr.ca><3368A6FE.41C6@cca.rockwell.com> <5kaqd4$m9b@bcrkh13.bnr.ca><3369FCAF.41C6@cca.rockwell.com> Organization: The University of York, UK Newsgroups: comp.lang.c++,comp.lang.c,comp.lang.ada Date: 1997-05-14T00:00:00+00:00 List-Id: On 2 May 1997, Jon S Anthony wrote: > In article <3369FCAF.41C6@cca.rockwell.com> Roy Grimm writes: > > > "We're teaching Computer Science here. If you want engineering, go to > > an engineering school." That's the prevailing attitude with many of the > > CompSci programs at small liberal arts colleges. They teach the > > "science" of programming almost as a subfield of Mathematics. The > > This is actually very apropos to the problem. Most of what passes as > so called "computer science" is just watered down mathematics - > discrete mathematics (asymptotic algorithm analysis is fundamentally > various techniques of counting, i.e., a bit of combinatorics) and some > bits of formal logics (which is where the oft mentioned "halting > problem" and such comes from.) Take this away and you don't have much > left - unless you have the _application_ of that mathematics, i.e., > software engineering. > > Well, there is the AI camp, but there too, if you look at what much of > this is, it's being/been covered by philosophers and CogScis (and > often with rather more perspicacity). Well then let's not bother teaching computer science at all! Why not just make people do Maths + Philosophy degrees. Yes it's the same stuff, but don't Physics and Chemistry both cover atoms and electron shells? Don't both Biology and Chemistry cover Biological Chemistry? The fact is that a CS degree combines all these factors into a single degree related to the study of computers, and puts them in the correct context. Yes the idea of dominance in sequences is part of computer science, but they way I was taught it in maths is not particularly relvant to the complexity of algorithms. Unless you have a very good understanding of the principles behind the maths in a maths degree, it will take you a lot of experience to become a good programmer (e.g. Knuth) Of course there is a strong element of theory in CS degrees -- they want to get good research students to boost the department's standing against other universities, but you would have to have a poor department or be a poor student if you didn't pick up some of the fundamentals of good software design. :sb)