On Fri, 16 Feb 2007 at 14:01 -0700, Levi Pearson wrote: > Hans Fugal <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > Which is why Computer Scientists code, because code is basically an > > expression of that thought. This is where the confusion comes from: > > physicists generally don't build the stuff they dream up (they do of > > course do experiments), so nobdoy confuses them with engineers. > > Actually, a pretty good chunk of money goes into physics research so > they can build gigantic particle accelerators, huge radio telescopes, > and other equipment so they can test their theories at both ends of > the size spectrum. I don't know exactly what 'stuff they dream up' > was originally being referred to, but a theory in Physics isn't > usually worth much at all until it's been demonstrated to correspond > with something in the real world.
Ok, I knew that wouldn't come across right. Physicists do of course build very expensive toys. But wait, they don't build them. They design them and hire other people to build them. I said "stuff they dream up" because I have no idea what current research in physics is. But whatever it is, it's not directly applicable to our lives. It takes an engineer (or someone who's both an engineer and a physicist) to bridge the gap from science to practice. CS is less physical than physics, definitely more mathematical. Is CS a misnomer? Should we rather be called Computer Mathematics? Perhaps. But the point is the same. CS involves coding in the same way physics involves building particle accelerators. Web programming and business logic programming is the equivalent of making flashlights and crowbars (which depend on principles of physics). -- Hans Fugal ; http://hans.fugal.net There's nothing remarkable about it. All one has to do is hit the right keys at the right time and the instrument plays itself. -- Johann Sebastian Bach
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