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Re: C# is not Dylan (was: Re: C# : The new language from M$)
> From: "Frank A. Adrian" <fadrian@uswest.net>
> Date: Sat, 1 Jul 2000 22:30:03 -0400 (EDT)
> To: info-dylan@ai.mit.edu
> Subject: Re: C# is not Dylan (was: Re: C# : The new language from M$)
>
> Yes, but it makes about as much sense as citing Pinker's and Chomsky's works
> as a defense of saying that syntactic choices don't matter when applied to
> artificial languages.
Having read Pinker (if anyone hasn't then do, The Language Instinct is
inspirational), I'd say that his accessible explanation of Chomsky's syntax
trees, deep and surface structure, and the process of creolization are very
relevent both to the creation of artificial syntax and its socialized use. A
language's "artificiality" has nothing to do with how applicable this is, if
anything, artfificial languages are easier examples (apart from Fortran :-).
BNF and Chomsky trees come from the same period and are mirror images of
each other to a degree. The contrast between deep & surface structure is
important in deflating a debate (however nonsensical) about infix vs. prefix
syntax for languages with fundamentally similar underlying systems.
When considering a language whose readability is entirely up to the user,
the structures that programmers use to achieve this must be regarded as
external to, and a socialized appropriation of, the syntax of the original
language and therefore a form of creolization. Machine-generated Lisp looks
very different from the elegance of good human-generated Lisp.
I don't see how immature attempts at demonization are more relevant than
this. In my 3 years on this newsgroup this is the closest I've seen to a
flamewar, and comp.lang.dylan isn't moderated.
- Rob.
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