Human-Nets-Request%rutgers@brl-bmd.UUCP (Human-Nets-Request@rutgers) (08/30/83)
HUMAN-NETS Digest Monday, 29 Aug 1983 Volume 6 : Issue 53
Today's Topics:
Query - 68000 protocol implementations,
Computers and People - Electronic Mail comes of Age &
Computers on TV &
Calling Channel & Bboards (2 msgs) &
Teaching about Computers &
The Worth of Technology (3 msgs)
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Date: Mon 29 Aug 83 09:29:05-EDT
From: Marc Shapiro <SHAPIRO@CMU-CS-C.ARPA>
Subject: 68000 protocol implementations query
Planning to implement high-level protocols on a 68000-based card
attached to a 10 Mb/s Ethernet, I would like to get in contact with
people who have implemented eihter TCP-IP or XNS protocols on
similar hardware (preferably in C). We could exchnage experiences and
possibly programs.
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Date: 26 August 1983 14:43 edt
From: TMPLee.DODCSC at MIT-MULTICS
Subject: Electronic Mail comes of Age
I assume I'm not the only one to notice this, but I just got a routine
mailing from the IEEE computer society asking for updates on the
mailing list for its technical committees (they are *shudder*
converting over to a new computerized database). Anyway, this is the
FIRST time I've seen such a mailing that in addition to the usual
street address, title, phone number asked for electronic mail network
and mailbox address (if any).
Ted Lee
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Date: 27 Aug 83 11:18:40 EDT
From: SOMMERS@RU-GREEN.ARPA
Maybe this should go to SF-Lovers, but I thought it might
interest Human-Nets readers.
TELEVISION FOLLOWS IN THE WAY OF WARGAMES
Reading my local paper this morning, I came across an article
from Gannett News Service. It seems that one of the new shows for the
Fall season is a Hardy Boy's type mystery - with a twist of course.
This one is about four high school freshmen who build
themselves a "sophisticated computer" [on the order of a Vax maybe?]
and use it to solve mysteries.
Well, I guess it is nice that computer programmers are
considered to be role models...
liz//
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Date: 26 August 1983 22:11 EDT
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM @ MIT-MC>
Subject: calling channel & bboards
There's a problem with "Circulate to" -- the mailsystems on the
Arpanet aren't reliable enough. If a message passes thru ten
recipients there's a good chance at least on of them will be unable to
do the circulation automatically and will have to do it manually and
have a good chance of munging it, and there's a reasonable chance that
one of the "automatic" methods will randomly fail in some
unpredictable way. It would be an interesting experiment to have ten
or so people in one of these rings and see whether a message can make
one cycle before getting munged or lost. EMACS/RMAIL makes it easy to
do this, providing the "Circulate to" is in the body rather than the
header (I don't know if that field is known to this system, but I can
manually manipulate text between header and body easily to fake it
out), so I volunteer to be one of the ten if somebody wants to give it
a try.
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Date: 26 August 1983 23:55 edt
From: TMPLee.DODCSC at MIT-MULTICS
Subject: Re: calling channel & bboards
Your point is well-taken, 'though I can't remember any more what my
original comment was in answer to! But I should note, that the same
problem arises in the paper world: it is more frequent than I want to
admit that I have circulated something around the office only to have
it lost for a very long time or even for ever. I won't volunteer for
the experiment, if only because the mailsystem I use on Multics is
ancient, awkward, and inflexible (unless perhaps one is an expert
Multician, which I am not.) I suspect some of the theoretical and
practical work on distributed databases (commit points, etc.) and
recovery mechanisms are relevant here.
Ted
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Date: Mon, 29 Aug 83 10:33:15 EDT
From: Eric Albert <ealbert@BBN-UNIX>
Subject: So-called "losers"
This message is a response to the following message:
Date: 19 August 1983 02:00 EDT
From: Keith F. Lynch <KFL @ MIT-MC>
Subject: Losers
Keith Lynch's message about his difficulties teaching users struck me
as a perfect example of the kind of arrogance and lack of empathy
(note the wonderful subject heading -- how would YOU feel about a
teacher who charactersized their students as "losers"?!?) that turn
off non-computer people from learning computers. What's lovely about
this example is that the subjects he complains about are precisely
those where I would expect people to have trouble.
... They particularly seem to have mental blocks when it comes
to the notion of data types (they have a very hard time
understanding the difference between integers and floating point
numbers, or they insist that this is just an artifact of the
language being used. ...
The distinction between fixed and floating point is very
non-intuitive. I never encountered the concept, despite numerous math
courses, until I started using computers, and I remember thinking it
an arbitrary distinction. Furthermore, it IS "an artifact of the
language" -- some computer languages don't distinguish. Users find
these languages much easier to understand.
... Not one that I know of has ever been able to understand
why -1 to the integer 3 is -1 but -1 to the floating 3 is
undefined.) ...
I'm not surprised users don't understand this; I find it downright
weird! Again, many languages will do the automatic conversion to
FIXED here (perhaps warning you if they have to round).
... or has fully understood that an equal sign has two totally
different meanings in a line of BASIC depending on context. ...
The use of "=" for two very different functions (one of which involves
statements such as "X = X + 1" which is mathematically impossible!)
can be bewildering. Here too, many computer languages use different
symbols precisely to avoid this confusion.
Why can't Keith understand that many people have not spent years with
computers? Every point he complains about is an example of a problem
that ANY intelligent, computer-naive user would have. When a
scientist complains that numbers in computers don't work the way
numbers in mathematics work, he is pointing out a flaw with computer
systems, NOT demonstrating his own stupidity. Keith, with his
inability to see beyond "that's the way computers work and that's all
there is to it" is the one who displays lack of depth.
... I once spent several hours trying to implement fixed column
sequential line numbers in Gosling's Emacs because an IBM type
wanted to be able to edit the numbers and then use the VMS SORT
command on the resulting file to get the manually renumbered
lines back into order. It seemed like a strange requirement,
but...
It finally turned out that he wanted this so that he could MOVE A
LINE AROUND IN THE FILE. I nearly gave up computers that day...
This story is also instructive. Clearly, Keith was totally unable to
determine what the user actually wanted, and so went off to implement
a bizarre program whose purpose was incomprehensible. This attitude
of "humoring" the user, rather than determining what is the (usually
quite sensible) thing they really want to do, comes from a general
lack of respect for users. This lack of respect is, of course,
totally unfounded: it is based on the fact that the user doesn't
understand computer science (which is important to Keith), even though
the user may understand business, or chemistry, or some other field
(which is not important to Keith) expertly. Solipsism at its most
pronounced!
What we have here is a person who is so deep in his field that he can
no longer distinguish between what is "intuitively obvious" and what
is merely a bizarre artifact that he has become accustomed to. This
complete lack of empathy leads him to an obnoxious "blame the victim"
stance. Having done it many times, I know that one can explain these
concepts (weird as they indeed are) to people.
... Sigh. Maybe I'm just not a very good teacher. ...
Precisely. I feel sorry for the people with whom he works, who may
now believe that there is something wrong with THEM.
--Eric Albert (ealbert @ BBN-UNIX)
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Date: 26 Aug 83 13:16:51 PDT (Friday)
From: Wedekind.ES@PARC-MAXC.ARPA
Subject: Re: Techno-philosophy
"Life will get even worse if AI succeeds in automating true
creativity. What point would there be in learning to paint,
write, etc., if your home computer could knock out more
artistic creations than you could ever hope to master? (This
has always been the problem of the wealthy classes: they can
buy better quality than they could ever learn to make.) We
will all be reduced to spectators and dilettantes."
Ken,
You make it sound like we'll be looking around for things to do. To
me it seems like we'll have our hands full and can use all the help we
can get.
How about finding out about the world as a purpose? In our spare
time, we could make art or useful things or figure out better ways of
living together. It seems like these are natural outlets for the
curiosity and manipulative urges that so far have mainly kept our
stomachs full.
The fact that AI might outclass us soon (or that extraterrestrials
might now exist who can do these things better) shouldn't slow things
down.
The same goes for Bruce Hamilton's "average" people - lots of
the stuff we do will have been done already (maybe even by other
people); so what?
Most people are "outclassed" in everything by someone, most learning
isn't research, most traveling isn't exploration, etc. Should I have
skipped my last Grand Canyon trip because other people saw it first,
or sold my chess set when I read about Belle (or maybe I should wait
until Belle beats Fischer and then sell it)? Does this mean that
weekend tennis players should trade their racqets in for Wimbledon
tickets? I'm sure you know that fulfillment often comes from
personally taking part, even if other people could have produced a
better end product than you personally. How will this change when
it's machines that can produce a better end product than anyone in
your race?
cheers,
Jerry
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Date: Mon, 29 Aug 83 08:33:49 EDT
From: Natalie Dehn <Dehn@YALE.ARPA>
Subject: Ken Laws's human chauvinistic comments re AI and Creativity
Even without AI, there are other people (namely, humans) who are
creative, other people who are intelligent. Is this so horribly
threatening? Personally, I'm all for increasing the number my
"competitors", be it through educational innovations or through AI
research and, eventually (we've a long ways to go), development.
Exposure to the products of "competing" intelligences and creative
beings has always served to stimulate and develop, rather than
stiffle, my own intelligence and creativity. Same goes for personal
interaction with such people.
Is there really some advantage to limiting intelligence and creativity
to humans? Or perhaps it would be better if we could limit it to U.S.
citizens (that's one way of handling the Fifth Generation "problem")!
Or to people from one's own state or town, or university or
department. Ethnic group or gender, anyone?
This is not to say that the development of AI creativity is just
another way of acquiring intellectual companions and benefactors; nay,
it serves an even MORE important purpose (given that we already HAVE
humans available to serve in this first capacity) -- namely, as a very
promising methodological means of determining how creativity WORKS.
(I'm curious; aren't you?) In the process, we are also learning a
great deal about reconstructive memory mechanisms and many other
psychological/implementational questions of human mind.
If there's some good reason why AI creativity research should be
halted, let me know, convince me. But until then I, for one, am
ploughing ahead.
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Date: Fri, 26 Aug 83 17:35 EDT
From: MJackson.Wbst@PARC-MAXC.ARPA
Subject: The influence of technology on our well being
From: Robert Elton Maas <REM @ MIT-MC>
The solution to increased life expectancy is to permit the
elderly to work instead of forcing them to totally retire. If
the elderly do useful work, it'll be the same as if they were
young people working.
Fine moves in this direction are only to be applauded.
However, this only works if the aged are in good health. More
generally, advances in medical science have enabled such life-saving
feats of treatment that over 10% of our GNP is going for medical care,
and the percentage is rising. How do we bring this burden under
control? I'm extremely uncomfortable with money as a rationing
mechanism for this particular resource; on the other hand, who would
you like to see empowered to tell a dying person, "Sorry, society
can't afford the cost of your treatment?"
Mark
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End of HUMAN-NETS Digest
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