The Mathematical Hacker

I find it disturbing that this article has been written in 2012. While I was reading it I really thought that it was at least 10 years old. Computer science researchers are doing actual mathematics, and they are clearly more in what the article calls "Lisp school" than the "Fortran school". Research in functional programming is mostly mathematics. Lambda calculi (which was originally not developed to be a programming language at all), types, logic, category theory… Most of the tools…

> But rarely in these discussions will you find relevant mathematical considerations. If the goal is to compute a Fibonacci number or a factorial, the proper solution is not a recursive function, but rather knowledge of mathematics. If you want precise results for large sizes, then the integer-arithmetic recurrence is faster than computing the square root of 5 to very high precision and raising it to the nth power. The author’s “proper solution” might better be named the “naive undergraduate…

Farsightedness. Things that are too close cannot be focused on clearly. Step back. Lets talk Ohms law and "electronics people". Some systems level folks care only about microwave RF scattering parameters and smith charts. Others just use NEC tables vaguely derived from Ohms law but all that matters to them is passing inspection. Some consider Ohms law a dumbed down version of Maxwells equations for fools. Some, believe it or not, actually use Ohms law directly. There is no "right…

In Steve Yegge’s linked post: > Math is a lot easier to pick up after you know how to program. In fact, if you're a halfway decent programmer, you'll find it's almost a snap. This couldn’t be more wrong. Mathematics is the hardest thing I have ever done. I’m sorry, but mathematics is orders of magnitude more intensive and difficult than most programming. A simple fact that shows this is the amount of programmers who have no formal training in…