richw@ada-uts.UUCP (11/12/85)
I recently received some E-mail which simply made my day. Having been subjected to a few too many years of MIT, it was very satisfying. I'm presenting it here to present a different viewpoint about Lisp and it's place-of-worship. The author's name has been omitted since this was E-mail originally; if only I could sign my name to it... -- Rich Wagner -------------------------------------------------------------------- >> "Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs", >> by Abelson, Sussman, & Sussman >> >> "A data object that has a type that can be recognized and tested >> is said to have _manifest_ type." > > My response has nothing to do with the original subject; I just > couldn't resist the opportunity to knock MIT tunnel-vision (deservedly, > I think). One of the biggest problems with the CS program at MIT > where, of course, Abelson and Sussman^2 wrote that book, is the > "Everything was invented here" syndrome. Sometimes, when the outside > world simply *can't* be ignored anymore it takes on the form "Everything > was invented here *first*". > > That text is somewhat horrifying. It does a number of things very > well. I would recommend using it (BUT NEVER ALONE!) in a course where > you'd like to get across the concept of abstraction and the distinction > between function and form. But the horrible thing is that they imply > (through omission, largely) that what is in that book is *all there is > to know*. They never say "This is one way to do it". Instead they say > "This is THE way to do it." > > The MIT preoccupation with interactive/interpreted languages shows up > in the passage you used as a reference. It is simply never mentioned > in the text that WHEN you try to figure out an object's type can be of > tremendous importance. For the vast majority of people in CS, the > distinction between "static" evaluation and "runtime" evaluation is of > enormous value. Yet Abelson, Sussman and Sussman blithely ignore all > that because it's not LISP or a LISP derivative. As you have found > out, this is a disservice to their readers and most especially to > their students, many of whom will never leave the MIT community, but > academic inbreeding is another flame...