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Interview with Jaron Lanier on "Phenotropic" Development

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the stuff-to-read dept.

Sky Lemon writes "An interview with Jaron Lanier on Sun's Java site discusses 'phenotropic' development versus our existing set of software paradigms. According to Jaron, the 'real difference between the current idea of software, which is protocol adherence, and the idea [he is] discussing, pattern recognition, has to do with the kinds of errors we're creating' and if 'we don't find a different way of thinking about and creating software, we will not be writing programs bigger than about 10 million lines of code no matter how fast our processors become.'"

3 of 264 comments (clear)

  1. Full of it. by cmason · · Score: 5, Insightful
    If you think about it, if you make a small change to a program, it can result in an enormous change in what the program does. If nature worked that way, the universe would crash all the time. Certainly there wouldn't be any evolution or life.

    <cough>Bullshit.</cough>

    This guy obviously knows nothing about biology. A single base change in DNA can result in mutations that cause death or spontaneous abortion. As little as a change in a single 'character' can be lethal. That's a pretty "small change" that results in a pretty big "crash."

    I'm not sure if this invalidates his argument, but it certainly doesn't do much for his credibility.

    --
    "If you are an idealist it doesn't matter what you do or what goes on around you, because it isn't real anyway."-R.P.W.
  2. 10 million lines of bullpucky by aminorex · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And when you link your 10 million line program with my
    10 million line program, we've got a 20 million line program.
    This idea of an inherent limit to the complexity of
    programs using current methods is pure larksvomit, and
    if Jaron Lanier sells it, he's a snake oil hawker.

    This is Jack's total lack of surprise -> :|

    --
    -I like my women like I like my tea: green-
  3. Big Programs by Afty0r · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "if 'we don't find a different way of thinking about and creating software, we will not be writing programs bigger than about 10 million lines of code no matter how fast our processors become."

    Fantastic! We'll all get down and program small, specific routines for processing data, each one doing its' own job and doing it well. Those nasty, horrid standard protocols he refers to will allow all these small components to easily talk to each other - across architectures, networks etc.

    Oh wait, this is the way it already works. Is this guy then, proposing that we learn a new way to program because our systems aren't monolithic enough? *sigh*