You just READ the Google homepage. What actually happened? How do
you digest your dinner? The problem at hand is not a new one.
Couple years ago (2011), David Krakauer gave the Ulam lecture, which had
some observations on outsourcing competencies. I seem to recall he
thought it was a good and necessary thing.
On 3/21/13 5:25 PM, Joshua Thorp wrote:
Probably the issue pops up when turning the wheel doesn't have the
desired effect. Without knowing more about how the car works all the
user can say is "it doesn't work", and all the mechanic can say is
bring it in.
Having an idea of how things are supposed to work one or two levels
down can be useful when dealing with them when they don't. And
knowing who to talk to, and what to say. Sure you can drive without
knowing about how internal combustion works, but having an idea that
gas is necessary component and when it isn't present the car won't go
is also useful and could save you a headache down the road.
Seems to me the more interesting question is what level of detail
should we understand something like a web page or a car. We have a
fairly worked out basic level of understanding needed for operating a
vehicle, but even here that level of understanding is generally going
down as we lock up more and more of the operational decisions in black
boxes instead of requiring the human to attend to them.
So the question is where do we stop this trend of not knowing, or do
we just want to live in a point and click world where everything
either works or no help but to go to the experts when it doesn't.
--joshua
On Mar 21, 2013, at 5:11 PM, Russ Abbott <russ.abb...@gmail.com
<mailto:russ.abb...@gmail.com>> wrote:
The standard example is that most people can drive a car even though
they don't understand how internal combustion engines work -- and
they would even if the car were powered by an electric motor. I have
no problem with putting that in terms of contracts: turn the steering
wheel and the car wheels turn. One doesn't have to know how power
steering works.
/-- Russ Abbott/
/_____________________________________________/
/ Professor, Computer Science/
/ California State University, Los Angeles/
/ My paper on how the Fed can fix the economy:
ssrn.com/abstract=1977688 <http://ssrn.com/abstract=1977688>/
/ Google voice: 747-/999-5105
Google+: plus.google.com/114865618166480775623/
<https://plus.google.com/114865618166480775623/>
/ vita: /sites.google.com/site/russabbott/
<http://sites.google.com/site/russabbott/>
CS Wiki <http://cs.calstatela.edu/wiki/> and the courses I teach
/_____________________________________________/
On Thu, Mar 21, 2013 at 3:47 PM, Gillian Densmore
<gil.densm...@gmail.com <mailto:gil.densm...@gmail.com>> wrote:
where's the part of you beem into the google page: it instantly
forms metrics about you and presents you with "useful" adds (as
aposed to to minuses) :P
On Thu, Mar 21, 2013 at 4:00 PM, Owen Densmore
<o...@backspaces.net <mailto:o...@backspaces.net>> wrote:
On Thu, Mar 21, 2013 at 12:40 PM, Russ Abbott
<russ.abb...@gmail.com <mailto:russ.abb...@gmail.com>> wrote:
I disagree with Jean-Baptiste Query's presentation, which
implies that you have to understand all levels of any
process to understand the process itself. If that were
true we would all have to understand quantum mechanics to
understand everything. But no one
understands quantum mechanics. So no one understands
anything. <snip>
Well, the point is that for non tech folks, it is a tower of
babble.
I like the presentation because it starts with a simple idea:
view a web page, and shows the dirty little secret.
I believe it should be the intro to a book that does what I
think you might prefer: top down, breadth first introduction
to digitology.
Or in other words: modularity, and its implementation in
standard formats and protocols. And no, modularity .. tho
nice in program structure .. does not happen without the
standard formats and protocols.
I have found it hard to explain modularity to non geek folks.
Can you do it? Most start with code, which as I say, is
wrong. But most folks understand contracts, and that leads
into protocols & formats.
I tried to explain DNS once to a very very smart guy.
Registrars, Name Servers, TLD hierarchy. His questions kept
leading deeper into details, and made it all impossible. My
poor friend actually got dizzy and ended up in tears.
-- Owen
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