From: "Vladimir Olensky" <vladimir_olensky@yahoo.com>
Subject: Re: histrionics
Date: 1999/09/11
Date: 1999-09-11T00:00:00+00:00 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <rtiq3si91iv24@corp.supernews.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: 7r9rkj$g75$1@nnrp1.deja.com
Robert Dewar wrote in message <7r9rkj$g75$1@nnrp1.deja.com>...
>In article <rtg6mdp71iv13@corp.supernews.com>,
> "Vladimir Olensky" <vladimir_olensky@yahoo.com> wrote:
>>
>> Prolog is best suited for writing expert systems.
>
>Well this is of course the argument that the Japanese were
>trying to make in the 5GL project, but at the time, most
>US experts in expert systems were unconvinced, and considered
>LISP a better choice. That opinion has not significantly
>changed, although you probably find more expert systems written
>in "conventional" languages like C or Ada these days than
>before.
May be this is because writing complex programs in Prolog requires
very high level of abstract thinking to be able to express complex
problems using short logic predicates sentences.
It is always more easy to describe something in many words
than in couple of words:-)
Another thing is that it may be difficult for many people to grasp
the idea of backtracking and recursion and be able to understand
program execution that uses them.
Iterative algorithms implemented using conventional languages may
have much more lines of code but be much more easy understandable.
> But the fact of the matter is
>that Prolog just has not lived up to the promises we heard in
>Tokyo.
I think that one of the problems was that they were too enthusiastic
and they underestimated complexity of human thinking.
Not everything can be described by logic predicates and algorithmes.
Irrational thinking, intuition and wisdom that are part of human nature
(some people have only the number one from that list :-) can hardly
be expressed using any programming language. There are other
ways of doing that. I am sure that after breakthrough in nanomolecular
technologies and bio_technologies (probably before 2010 ) we will see
a lot of amazing things.
Regards.
next prev parent reply other threads:[~1999-09-11 0:00 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 31+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
1999-09-09 0:00 histrionics G
1999-09-08 0:00 ` histrionics Preben Randhol
1999-09-09 0:00 ` histrionics G
1999-09-09 0:00 ` histrionics Nick Roberts
1999-09-09 0:00 ` histrionics Robert Dewar
1999-09-10 0:00 ` histrionics Vladimir Olensky
1999-09-10 0:00 ` histrionics Robert Dewar
1999-09-10 0:00 ` histrionics Ted Dennison
1999-09-11 0:00 ` histrionics Bob Collins
1999-09-12 0:00 ` histrionics Vladimir Olensky
1999-09-13 0:00 ` histrionics Ted Dennison
1999-09-11 0:00 ` Vladimir Olensky [this message]
1999-09-11 0:00 ` histrionics Robert Dewar
1999-09-11 0:00 ` histrionics Vladimir Olensky
1999-09-13 0:00 ` histrionics Robert Dewar
1999-09-11 0:00 ` histrionics Robert Dewar
1999-09-11 0:00 ` histrionics Vladimir Olensky
1999-09-14 0:00 ` histrionics Robert I. Eachus
[not found] ` <7s2l7b$kmr$1@nnrp1.deja.com>
[not found] ` <37E81661.6DCA23E4@mitre.org>
1999-09-22 0:00 ` histrionics p.obry
[not found] ` <7saju5$6h6$1@nnrp1.deja.com>
1999-09-22 0:00 ` histrionics Robert I. Eachus
1999-09-22 0:00 ` histrionics Ehud Lamm
1999-09-23 0:00 ` histrionics Ehud Lamm
1999-09-23 0:00 ` histrionics Ehud Lamm
1999-09-23 0:00 ` Sums of cubes (was Re: histrionics) Robert I. Eachus
1999-09-24 0:00 ` Wes Groleau
1999-09-24 0:00 ` Robert I. Eachus
1999-09-27 0:00 ` Wes Groleau
1999-09-24 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
1999-09-24 0:00 ` Robert I. Eachus
1999-09-24 0:00 ` Wes Groleau
1999-09-25 0:00 ` Robert Dewar
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