
Computerists - oskarth
http://blog.fogus.me/2013/04/10/computerists/
======
jmduke
There's the old quote attributed to Djikstra:

 _Computer Science is no more about computers than astronomy is about
telescopes._

But who cares about titles, really? Why do they matter?

The article makes the claim that you can tell someone's not a scientist if
they have 'scientist' in their title. I'd argue for a corollary: you can tell
someone probably doesn't deserve their title if they spend any significant
amount of time worrying about it.

~~~
Fuzzwah
As someone who has just moved to the US and been through the "joy" of looking
for work; me.

I'm a server admin, I have come to realize that what I do can be titled many
different things. System admin / engineer, network admin / engineer, server
admin / engineer, windows / linux admin / engineer..... and more.

I dearly wish there was just one title for my job.

~~~
rhizome
Systems Engineer, note the plural on "systems." Don't shy away from this, it's
a title that has existed for decades and you're in good company. Resist title
inflation!

~~~
tgflynn
But in many industries, defense and aerospace in particular, systems engineers
are people who integrate multiple technologies to build systems (such as an
aircraft or missile). They don't manage computer systems.

~~~
rhizome
Are we talking about those industries? It's a valid title for many sectors,
and is perfectly cromulent for OS/Neteng roles.

~~~
clebio
well, when you're searching tech job boards, it sure matters. As (another)
Systems Engineer (in the sense of Von Bertalanffy not Von Neumann), searching
for relevant jobs is a _huge_ annoyance. I've given up on titles, and search
for, or look at, job descriptions, filtering mentally the various keywords
that are positive and negative indicators for what I do (feedback controls,
operations research, etc.).

~~~
rhizome
That goes for all of my job hunts too, but it doesn't mean I'm not whatever a
simplified title of my skills implies.

------
demian
Comment: _In English there is a split between Software Engineering and
Computer Science. German uses the word Informatik which comprises both
disciplines._

It's the same for most of continental Europe.

There is theory and research focused areas like computing or computational
mathematics, and there is application, informatics (more similar to a CS
degree) or informatics engineering (roughly an EECS degree, or a CS&SE with
more math, physics and electronics).

PS: In the US, the term "informatics" seems to be more related to the
"soft"(design and business) parts of european informatics, like IT,
Information Systems and Human-Computer Interaction.

PS2: In regard to the professional title, in Spain the people that study
informatics are generally called "informaticians" ("informáticos" in spanish).
But as with "computer scientist", people just use their job title as their
professional title.

~~~
samatman
With the notable exception of "bioinformatics", which is fairly maths
intensive.

~~~
demian
right, I should have used "area" instead of "term". I meant the
bachelors/masters/PhDs in "Informatics".

------
wooster
Computer Science is an example of a formal science:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Formal_science>

Or, in parts, an applied science:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Applied_science>

~~~
geoka9
Yes. I haven't seen a professional programmer who calls herself a computer
scientist. I think the author is beating a straw man.

And theoretical computer science is a branch of mathematics. It's as much
science as math is.

------
abcd_f
Neat, but

he clearly has never debugged COM bordello on Windows, because one simply
cannot do it without "deciding to stop goofing off and starting applying the
scientific method". To figure out what the heck 0x8C123456 for an error code
means and what triggers it, you make conjectures, run experiments, go for
repeatable results across multiple testbeds and frequently solicit peer review
of the results. "Not a scientist"? Ha!

~~~
fogus
Not that particular software no, but I'm used my share of dreck. Maybe I
guessed where the problem was and used experimentation to validate, but I
would hardly call that the scientific method.

~~~
seanmcdirmid
Programmers do you an abbreviated form of the scientific when debugging. Its
that we wear many hats actually. But whatever, its not a big deal for those in
industry.

For those of us doing academic research, however, the science part of computer
science is much more an issue; e.g. should a conference accept design papers
without empirical evidence?

------
c0g
Computer science and software engineering are different things. Computer
science is a specialised subset of mathematics, software engineering is the
process of making things that run on computers. They're connected in the same
way that civil engineering and physics are- one underpins the other, and maybe
in time what the physicists are doing will help make a good bridge. Science
underpins engineering, engineering justifies science.

------
snamellit
What's in a name...

99% of what is called Computer Science is more engineering based on the 1%
actually expanding the knowledge and making Elsevier richer.... (or not based
on science and just reinventing the wheel over and over again as aptly noted
by fogus).

I personally like the title "IT guy" as it pretty sums up what the rest of the
world thinks of it all.

------
oskarth
Countries with the word 'democratic' in them:

 _\- People's Democratic Republic of Algeria

\- Congo, Democratic Republic of the

\- East Timor – Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste

\- Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia

\- Korea, North – Democratic People's Republic of Korea

\- Laos – Lao People's Democratic Republic

\- Nepal – Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal

\- São Tomé and Príncipe – Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe

\- Sri Lanka – Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka_

I don't know the details of the political situation in those countries, but my
hunch is that they are less likely to be democratic than your average country.

Is there a name for this phenomena?

~~~
rhizome
Well come on, why not consider context? There is no objective meaning of
"democratic" outside of the ideal that no country satisfies, so what we can
conclude is that in just about all cases it's to differentiate the governments
from their predecessors. It just sounds a little out of place because no
country called themselves anything like "The Glorious Dictatorship of Central
Africa," or, "Plundered Colony of France, Southeast Asia."

~~~
acomar
> There is no objective meaning of "democratic" outside of the ideal that no
> country satisfies, so what we can conclude is that in just about all cases
> it's to differentiate the governments from their predecessors.

Oh come on, you can generalize that argument to practically anything. No real
world examples live up to their platonic ideals so who cares if you call a
duck a horse, it's just to differentiate it from a different species of duck.

> "Plundered Colony of France, Southeast Asia."

I like it.

~~~
rhizome
_you can generalize that argument to practically anything_

Maybe, but that's not what I'm doing. I'm arguing for an implied "More-"
before "democratic." That's what I mean by context.

~~~
acomar
Several of the listed countries aren't democratic in any sense of the word.
Even with context the argument is still absurd -- we intend to communicate
meaning with the words we use, and the introductory paragraph in the OP and
the comment you replied to both highlight cases where what a word means and
how its use are unrelated.

~~~
rhizome
The sense with which you hear the word and the way the citizens hear it may be
different.

------
cygwin98
How about Computer Plumber, Network Plumber, System Plumber, Data Plumber?

~~~
VLM
An apprenticeship and licensing system would surely solve a large number of
problems (while creating a much smaller number of new problems). I'm sure the
computerist's union would be an absolute joy to deal with (sarcasm), no doubt
making every other skilled trades union look like civilized extroverted yes
men in relative comparison.

The existence of trained plumbers does not mean no civil engineers are
educated, or no environmental scientists exist.

We already have something like union rules so that wouldn't be much of a
change. I got yelled at for moving a monitor across a cube without having a A+
cert. I'm like, dude, I have a CCNP, I build my own ham radio gear and
microcontroller stuff at home, I've been building computers since that meant
hand soldering S100 boards, and I've been doing this stuff since before you
were born (literally). Oh OK then I won't write you up ... this time, but
don't do it again (WTF?)

~~~
cygwin98
Don't disagree with what you said.

Maybe I didn't put it clear. But I wasn't referring to apprenticeship, trade
union or anything relevant to them, I was simply joking about the "plumbing"
factor of any computer-related jobs/roles, the majority of them are as boring
as "plumbing".

------
ggchappell
I agree about the unsuitability of terms like "computer science". I'm a
professor of computer science. I'd rather be a "professor of informatics", but
C.S. is the term we're stuck with. And after all, it isn't really that bad;
the main downside is that people I meet at parties think my job is teaching
people to use MS-Word. (I used to be a professor of mathematics; the
misconceptions about that one are _scary_.)

In any case, I'd like to point out that this use of "science", while not in
accord with the most common usage of the term, is not actually dishonest.
Rather, it harkens back to an older use of "science" as a more general term
for knowledge related to some field of study.[1]

[1] <https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/science> \- see English noun definitions 1
& 2.

------
Fuzzwah
I've worked in roles which were titled "technologist". I think it was the most
correct position name I've had.

~~~
gee_totes
On a related note, I was thrilled when Craigstlist opened up an "Internet
Engineers" job section. I think that is a great title.

------
x3ord
A lot of trained computer scientists work primarily as engineers. Sometimes
engineers do science. Sometimes scientists do engineering. In my experience
it's not clear cut.

Depending on the sub field of CS, some academics do mostly engineering stuff
with (hopefully) rigorous evaluations of their work, while others (HCI in
particular) do a lot of formal science.

Outside of a handful places (like MSR and similar) people with computer
science training generally don't participate in the production of new
knowledge within the framework of the scientific method. But usually they
could, if needed.

------
Fleuri
Compared to what physicISTs, biologISTs, or these scientISTs practice,
computer scientists are more likely to be mathmatICIANs and logiICIANs, right?
So "Computericians" might be a better title for them.

Also we have the word "Hacker", which is a marvelous invention, and which make
these scientists that deal with computers sound so different. Though sometime
it's hard to draw the line between what we call "computer scientists" and
"programmers" when we use "hacker", but "hacker" is initially been employed as
a term for academes, and what's more, we like it, right?

------
juiceandjuice
Personally, even though I have a BS in Physics, have done research for 4
years, and develop software exclusively with astrophysics experiments at a
physics lab (I'm even on the most cited astronomy paper of 2012)... I have a
hard time calling myself a physicist, or even an engineer for that matter.

Calling myself a "computerist" or even a "computer scientist" would feel a lot
like I'd be furthering the dilution of titles with the inclusion of
mediocrity, akin to the "technical support engineer".

------
kyllo
It's worth noting that "computer" used to be a job title itself, before
mechanical computers replaced human computers.

Now that a computer is a machine that executes sets of instructions issued to
it by humans, I think "Computer Programmer" is a perfectly descriptive job
title for any human that authors those sets of instructions.

Whether or not a computer programmer is also a scientist is more a function of
their training than their job title/description.

------
c0mpute
In the purist sense of a "scientist" I have to agree there is not much
observation -> Feedback -> progress happening. But what about some of the
research in the universities?

It is worth mentioning what Richard Feynman thought about "Computer Science" -
He said it was never a science but an aspect of engineering:

<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lL4wg6ZAFIM>

~~~
fogus
> some of the research in the universities

Some of that for sure could and should be called science. However, most of the
research being done is not actually pure research either but rather problem
solving. (and sometimes not even solving per se)

------
trent_91
In my university, they had computer science (which was basically maths that
became algorithms), software engineering (which many people think is computer
science), and computer applications, which was what some people call
"informatics".

Computer science is an overused term for something that is closer to maths but
thought to be closer to engineering.

~~~
VLM
We also had a computer engineering dept which mostly consisted of sticking
7400 series TTL chips in breadboards, later VHDL/Verilog. Basically the EE
curriculum with more computer topic classes and less analog/RF classes.

And like the rest of the engineering dept there was "real" (aka theoretical)
and "technology" (applied) degrees. One of my degrees is a AS in EE-T although
I went right into computers for the BSCS (with the idea of getting into
embedded using the AS-EET as leverage, which I have never managed to do, LOL)

------
mangrish
Hopefully someone has already said this:

Computer science is about research in the theory of computation. When you do
your CS degree it is designed with you becoming a researcher/hacker.

Software engineering is about the practical application of that theory
executed in a disciplined way.

No need for new titles!

------
bnegreve
As the article suggests, science is a methodology, not a field of study. You
can apply scientific reasoning to computers as well as anything else that is
sufficiently stable to be studied.

So computer scientist makes some sens... Computerist? I am not sure.

------
aethertap
I think my title would fit better if it was "Error Scientist."

All of my best hypothesis crafting, experiment design, and data analysis seems
to be done in the name of figuring out why my code is broken.

------
blasdel
I use "Beep Boop" as my umbrella term

It's particularly good as an initial answer to "what do you do", especially
accompanied by a hunt-and-peck typing pantomime.

------
dorkrawk
Most people who get a BS in biology end up becoming scientific biologists,
though they might apply things that they've learned about biology in more
practitioner type careers. Most people who get a BS in computer science don't
go on to be "computer scientists", though they hopefully apply things they've
learned in practitioner type careers. Of course people without serious
research oriented training/education/focus aren't going to be professional
scientists.

~~~
VLM
Most people who define themselves as having a BS in bio (as opposed to it
merely being a stepping stone) work as lab techs ranging from $10/hr pharmacy
techs up to maybe $25/hr at a med testing lab in an expensive cost of living
area. At least in the old days. Currently, probably near half end up as
waitresses and bartenders, completely out of the field.

Most people who get a BS in computer science (not as a stepping stone to a PHD
or whatever, etc) end up on helpdesks, maybe pulling cable or replacing mice,
not doing anything scientific. Basically like the bio lab techs, it amounts to
training not education. The top 25% or so, maybe less, might get software dev
jobs or maybe system/network admin jobs. Even in current conditions, most will
end up in their field, maybe $8/hr no benes at a call center but at least more
or less in their field. The HN crowd tends a bit toward the upper level of the
pack, so yes, most HN readers have it far better than median.

~~~
learc83
>Most people who get a BS in computer science (not as a stepping stone to a
PHD or whatever, etc) end up on helpdesks, maybe pulling cable or replacing
mice...

I'm gonna need to see some evidence to back that up before I believe it. Based
on the experiences of everyone I know with a CS degree, that is completely
wrong.

Are you confusing CS with CIS?

>maybe $8/hr no benes at a call center but at least more or less in their
field.

I made more than $8 an hour at my first retail job. If you have a CS degree
and you're making $8 an hour, something is very wrong.

~~~
VLM
I tried googling around and cannot find any direct evidence. I will say there
is a feast/famine effect and right now in the hot areas looks better than I've
seen since the late 90s.

~~~
willismichael
> late 90s

Ahh, that explains it.

------
leoc
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Materials_science>

------
davidroberts
We can call ourselves "algorithmists."

