Personality Types In my first semester for grad school, one professor shared a case study with us about two new employees joining a new company.  One person went out of his was to schmooze and make social connections while neglecting his upcoming deadlines.  The other focused on delivery, neglecting politicking in order to complete his tasks on time.  The moral of the lesson was met with little surprise by most of the class but shocked me.  The character who worked to meet his deadlines was unanimously identified as ineffective.  The professor and class felt that social connections were clearly first priority while deliverables were subordinate.  I felt that this was both unethical and irresponsible.  Despite my protest, the class and professor seemed dismissive of my point of view. Years later, I'm still not convinced that the moral of the case study should have been so black and white.  If it were a question of idealism versus practicalit...

The Purpose of Language Computers can't yet understand English.  It has largely to do with the utility that spoken language offers to humans.  It's partially a vehicle for communication.  It's partially a medium of expression.  In everyday conversation it's used to share ideas, to inspire, to evoke emotion, to send hidden messages, to obscure facts, to test, or even to actively deceive.  As the saying goes, "Speech was given to man to conceal his thoughts." Code clears out much of the ambiguity from human speech.  First, it isolates intent.  Computers don't have the need for emotional expression, influence, or deception.  Our interactions are purely factual and cooperative.  Trust can be assumed.  This greatly simplifies the exercise of extracting meaning from or embedding meaning into language. Declarative programming languages tell the computer what to do.  Even more precisely, imperative code tells the computer how to do it....