
Lisp, Jazz, Aikido - mpweiher
http://programming-journal.org/2018/2/10/
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taylodl
Interesting. I program for a living, love Lisp and my hobbies are playing Jazz
guitar and training in Tae Kwon Do (the art, not the sport) where I'm a 2nd
Dan. I never considered the similarities between the three things. What's
really interesting is the concept of _transgression._ In the end you don't
learn Lisp, Jazz or Tae Kwon Do. You learn techniques and then learn how to
create your own art. I've watched many students struggle with that concept
through the years with Jazz and Tae Kwon Do. Never thought about that applying
to Lisp as well.

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kazinator
Jazz has lots of parentheses: changing to another key, doing your little ii-
V-I or whatever, then popping back to where you were.

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submeta
The title reminds me of the book "Goedel, Escher, Bach" (Douglas Hofstadter).

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AllegedAlec
Except that Goedel, Escher, Bach is not as pretentious...

~~~
JasonFruit
I found Goedel, Escher, Bach just as pretentious and ridiculous as this paper.
As an undergrad, I wrote a paper that was almost that pretentious, and I'm
embarrassed about it every time I think of it. How do these things make it
past, in GED's case, editors, and in this case, both referees and editors?
Someone has to point out the Emperor's unfortunate nudity.

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jrq
I certainly disagree that GEB was pretentious. For beings that can understand
information, surely computation is the highest possible goal. To that end, a
certain seriousness and prestige is available when referring to CS.

We all have our opinions.

Did you find GEB to be a helpful reference? What kind of science were you
studying?

Not to invade your privacy, I was just curious.

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palimpsests
> For beings that can understand information, surely computation is the
> highest possible goal.

That sounds almost like a statement of religion. I am a being that understands
information; "computation" is not even remotely close to my highest goals.

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jrq
Maybe not as an individual, but as a society or as a species, there are few
absolutes for us to pursue. History and Math are the only absolutes we really
have.

What I'm meaning to say is its a righteous goal compared to pursuing art or
literature, because it's universal in nature.

I think Turing will be remembered as one of the few people who changed the
course of human thought in its entirety.

I understand what you're saying, and sure, my goal right now this weekend is
to get some plane tickets and an airbnb booked, there's no computing mysticism
there.

But as a whole, I think we humans have an objective to find four the most
information possible and to do the most computing as possible. That's
essentially what the singularity is about, a human creation coming to a point
of autonomy. That's the next step for humans, I think, abandoning flesh and
spreading autonomous machines throughout the cosmos.

I guess it IS my religion.

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toolslive
reminds me of: "How jazz musicians improvise" (P.N.Johnson-Laird)
[http://mentalmodels.princeton.edu/papers/2002improvisation.p...](http://mentalmodels.princeton.edu/papers/2002improvisation.pdf)

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pvaldes
It is expression-based, provides extensive control structures, is machine-
independent, can solve problems fast avoiding side effects and comes with a
convenient boken system (Not to mention looping fabulous in elegant male
skirts).

But It lacks a decent debug system in real time.

 _Your first grab failed, what do you want to do?:

:R1 TRY AGAIN

:R2 ABORT

:R3 EXIT THE BAR AND RETURN TO YOUR DESKTOP_

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rusk
From the very start I have to object strongly to his definition of Art as
being _" what we don't understand"_, and science being _" what we do"_.

An "Artifice" is a subject of human creativity. Science is such an artifice.
The actual effective practice of science is "an art" and one that many people
simply don't get.

Science is the art of developing a better understanding of that which we don't
know by applying that which we do ...

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baldfat
My personal definition (Coming from a more philosophy discipline.

Art is aesthetics with elements of intellect - Science is an intellectual
pursuit which can contain beauty.

[https://academic.oup.com/bjaesthetics/article-
abstract/30/1/...](https://academic.oup.com/bjaesthetics/article-
abstract/30/1/24/160514?redirectedFrom=PDF)

~~~
rusk
For me, science goes back to the root of the word. It originally goes back to
the scalpel, which was used to divide living tissue from dead tissue. That
which is objective vs that which is subjective.

Also, I wouldn't confine art to the purely aesthetic.

But that's just me!

~~~
qbrass
>For me, science goes back to the root of the word. It originally goes back to
the scalpel, which was used to divide living tissue from dead tissue. That
which is objective vs that which is subjective.

The word "shit" has the same origin, btw.

~~~
rusk
Yes, in German it’s more closely resembling as _scheisse_

It’s also present in “Schism”

~~~
rusk
And slice

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CyberDildonics
This seems like a contest for the most prententious paper ever written.

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carlesfe
I don't know why you are downvoted. This is an excerpt of the abstract:

> By introspecting my personal aesthetic sensitivities, I eventually realized
> that my tastes in the scientific, artistic, and physical domains are all
> motivated by the same driving forces, hence unifying Lisp, Jazz, and Aikido
> as three expressions of a single essence, not so different after all. Lisp,
> Jazz, and Aikido are governed by a limited set of rules which remain simple
> and unobtrusive. Conforming to them is a pleasure. Because Lisp, Jazz, and
> Aikido are inherently introspective disciplines, they also invite you to
> transgress the rules in order to find your own. Breaking the rules is fun.
> Finally, if Lisp, Jazz, and Aikido unify so many paradigms, styles, or
> techniques, it is not by mere accumulation but because they live at the
> meta-level and let you reinvent them. Working at the meta-level is an
> enlightening experience

I am hesitant to criticize the author, because I find the text so absurd that
I must clearly be missing something. It looks like satire written for
/r/iamverysmart.

I'd honestly appreciate being given more context from fellow HNers which
upvoted this story and found it interesting.

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vorpalhex
This is a pretty par-for-course academic paper written on the philosophy of
Aesthetics. The writer is using themselves as a subject via introspection,
which is perfectly allowed, and attempting to highlight the aesthetic
comparison between three of their favorite hobbies.

This isn't supposed to be a hard sciences paper. Aesthetics can, validly, be
introspected on a personal level. If reading the paper makes you feel
insecure, then you should probably engage in some self-introspection as well.

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AllegedAlec
> If reading the paper makes you feel insecure

Nice projecting. He said nothing about him feeling insecure. He (rightfully,
imho) said that the entire paper was incredibly pretentious.

~~~
vorpalhex
> that the entire paper was incredibly pretentious

Is it pretentious in it's writing style or it's topic?

Writing style wise it's a perfectly par-for-the-course humanities paper. It's
not a blog entry, nor a letter to a friend. It's a formal academic humanities
paper.

Topic wise, it's discussing aesthetics. There are plenty of places for
criticizing the authors aesthetic arguments (in a formal manner), but in terms
of writing about the topics and their relation to aesthetics the author does a
perfectly fine job touching on the usual points.

So I'm confused as to how the paper could be pretentious. He isn't making the
claim that the only way to achieve aesthetic pleasure is to partake in his
particular hobbies, or to argue for some idealized version of these hobbies.
He's not glorifying programming, jazz or martial arts as being anything other
than rule based frameworks with room for exceptions and growth. He isn't
making strong exclusionary arguments in regards to other languages. Nor does
he make any claim that he is special, or that his introspection is special or
unique.

So if reading a perfectly standard academic humanities paper leads you to
think it's incredibly pretentious, then that says something of the beholder.

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tr0ut
Aikido is that fantasy martial arts. The kind that only works when the
opponents are in on the ruse.

Blockchain is like the Aikido of technology.

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kalekold
> Aikido is that fantasy martial arts. The kind that only works when the
> opponents are in on the ruse.

This is the biggest fallacy people spout when evaluating Akido because they
only see it being used in practise situations.

Your partner has to be 'in on the ruse' so they don't get hurt! Aikido is full
of extremely damaging techniques and if your partner doesn't go where you're
leading them or if they don't flip and fall as you want, they would end up
with a broken wrist or neck.

Find your nearest dojo, have a go and see.

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kod
Studied Aikido for many years.

Can confirm it is "that fantasy martial art".

Your partner has to be in on it because otherwise you'd never have the
opportunity to apply the technique; no one's going to let you e.g. just grab a
wristlock off of their punch.

This is all down to how it is trained, training with no resistance leads to
fantasy land bullshit.

Watch black belt level Aikido randori. Contrast with judo, wrestling, bjj
sparring. The difference is obvious, one group is dancing in response to
choreographed zombie attacks, the other is learning how to really apply
techniques against resisting opponents.

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peatmoss
Have done judo, and it’s just as fictitious. It just operates by a different
contrived set of rules.

And yes, of course aikido is choreographed. That choreography is hard as hell.
On the other hand I’m pretty fearless about getting thrown. I’ve been to judo
dojos and traditional jujitsu dojos where my training partners had
breakthroughs because I was willing to commit completely to my attack rather
than hedge my attack for fear of “losing.”

Aikido is metal, because the curriculum is sprawling and deep, the ukemi is
far and away the hardest part of the practice (harder than applying the
techniques), and the psychology of the practice is often inscrutable to people
who are fixated on an incompatible model of instrumental utility.

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M_Bakhtiari
> Resistance is futile. You will be jazzimilated.

Thanks, but no thanks.

