On Sat, Dec 06, 2003 at 02:39:38AM -0800, Tom wrote: > On Fri, Dec 05, 2003 at 10:55:23PM -0700, Paul E Condon wrote: > > > [This rant is probably full of shit] :-) > > > > > Yes. ;-) > > The reason it sounds so dumb is everybody would be out of a job. > I've never met a single person yet who can truly look at statements like > this and say "yes, let's do that." > > 20 years from now somebody will suggest the same thing and win a nobel > prize. >
The person who wins to Nobel is not always the person who did the work. The work that is recognized by the Nobel award is not always truly important. The initial rant was about making computer software conform to a specification. This is not a really new idea. It suffers from two problems that remain unsolved: 1) all statements, including specifications, that are written in a natural language are inherently ambiguous. 2) Proving that an algorithm implements a particular specification correct has been shown, by experience, to be very difficult. I think there is a possibility of new ideas on this topic. This rant does not appear, to me, to contain anything new. It might have been appropriate as part of a research proposal 20 yrs ago, but today it doesn't cut it. I am 71 yrs of age this month, and retired. I am not worried about being put out of a job. Debian, GNU, and Linux are putting people out of jobs, by being the low cost provider of quality software. (Flame bait ;-) In fairness to the original ranter, the ideas are not rediculous. But they have been considered. If one hopes to make progress one should be aware of prior work, and attempt to address the reasons for its failure to solve the problem. -- Paul E Condon [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]