

A prophet will arise in CS - spottiness
http://www.scottaaronson.com/blog/?p=19

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hugh3
_there was a panel discussion on how to get the public excited about
theoretical computer science._

Forget it. Nothing is going to make the general public excited about
theoretical computer science. The general public wouldn't be excited about
theoretical computer science even if they _did_ understand it.

For the general public, the question of theoretical computer science is as
interesting as the question of how plumbing works. My computer, they would
say, is like my toilet -- it does what it's supposed to do most of the time,
and when it breaks down I pay money to get some random jerk in to fix it. I
suppose there's some quite interesting details involved in how rainwater that
falls into the mountains manages to find its way through a complicated series
of pipes to come into my toilet whenever I press this button, but there are
far more interesting things to think about, so let's leave those details to
the experts.

If a prophet of plumbing _did_ show up to explain all the presumably-
fascinating-to-someone details of how the city's water supply works then it
would probably hold my interest for the duration of a half-hour documentary,
but then I'd get on with my life with only a marginally-increased respect for
the plumbers who make it happen.

I'm sure that waiting for messiahs to show up is a pretty normal sort of human
activity, but I'd hate to encourage it.

~~~
patrickyeon
Forget it. Nothing is going to make the general public excited about
theoretical physics. The general public wouldn't be excited about physics even
if they _did_ understand the math of quantum physics.

For the general public, the question of what makes up matter is as interesting
as the question of how beer is made. Matter, they say, is just like beer --
sometimes it tastes different, but it's just there to quench my thirst and
mellow me out. I suppose there are interesting details involved in making
beer, but let's leave those to the experts.

When a prophet of beer (beer snob) _does_ show up, I listen to a lot of
descriptive words that don't mean much to me, learn some fascinating history,
but then the next evening I'll still be ordering the same regular as I did
last night.

And yet, against all that, Feynman and Hawking have sparked many peoples'
interest in physics, even among those who will never run an experiment, or
take a formal course. Computer science is not about computers, and there's no
need to conflate it with using a computer. See <http://csunplugged.com> for
some attempts to make CS interesting while teaching it to primary- and
secondary- school aged children without using actual computers, for example.

~~~
spottiness
Nobody knows Feynman, believe me. Ask around on the streets and maybe one in
500 will have some idea (if you really ask randomly). Many people have "seen"
Hawking, and they remember his physical condition and that he's very smart.
Nobody knows what Hawking does and I'd even say that nobody knows that the
name of the paraplegic genius is Stephen Hawking.

Jeannette Wing (CMU's head of CS) started a project sponsored by Microsoft
called "Computational Thinking" where she tried to make CS a mainstream tool
to make decisions in life. She's probably still working on it, but I always
found the idea too vague to have any impact. I remember that Daniel Sleator
thought the same when she first talked about it (I was there).
<http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~CompThink/>

~~~
patrickyeon
> Nobody knows Feynman, believe me.

Unfortunately, I do [believe you]. Nonetheless, if Hawking, Feynman, Sagan
(and I'm surprised we've forgotten Einstein until now) are the 'prophets' to
be held up for physics, they are the examples I would start from to look for a
CS prophet. Hofstadter or Turing, as have been mentioned elsewhere, would get
my vote. The one is dead, though, and the other has an excellent book or two,
but not at all the public image or body of "bite-sized" work that those
prophets of physics have.

------
bluekeybox
Alan Turing has enough of a tragic hero charisma to serve as one; it's
ridiculous his name isn't even mentioned in the post. It's another question
whether popularization is a good thing in the first place. According to one
sentiment, medicine is perceived as being "too popular" (no doubt at least in
part thanks to the popular medical dramas you see on TV), filled with people
who are in it exclusively for money rather than for intellectual challenge or
desire to help people. As a result, many bright people who would have made
great doctors do not go into it.

------
kenjackson
There's a fundamental difference between physics and CS in that there aren't
as many sci-fi aspects to CS theory. Think about what is popular in physics:
time travel, parallel universes, teleportation, beginning/end of the
universe/time, aliens.

What are the sci-fi things in CS? Really fast factoring and fast routing for a
vacuum cleaner sales guy.

The one potential element is AI. But CS has largely abandoned what the public
views as AI. And even when there's a public show of AI, think Watson, many in
CS come and say, "that's not really AI". IMO, AI is where the public can catch
on to CS. But AI isn't what's generally referred to as theoretical CS -- you
won't see AI papers at FOCS/STOC.

------
olalonde
What about Ray Kurzweil? <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Kurzweil>

~~~
BinaryAcid
Definitely a prophet in the sense described. Kurzweil is absolutely amazing.

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r00fus
Why wouldn't RMS be considered here? His "right to read" [1] is certainly
looking prophetic of late.

[1] <http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html>

~~~
ebiester
He's more of a Jeremiah, live-in-horse-dung type of prophet. We don't listen
to those prophets.

~~~
DennisP
Right, we just eventually look back and say "boy, we shoulda listened to that
guy."

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contextfree
Dijkstra kind of tried to be a prophet in this sense, though I guess he wasn't
writing for a general audience.

------
Typhon
A least, the Eschatology's unusual :

« Repent, repent, miserable sinners ! Soon, I tell you, those machines you
count on will turn against you ! Soon, yes, in 27 years ! »

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michaelf
[http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,824058,00.h...](http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,824058,00.html)

I was surprised to find this old article from Time magazine back in 1956. It
concerns the solution to Post's Problem, which the article describes quite
succinctly as:

| The problem: Does each non-recursive, recursively enumerable set have the
property that every recursively enumerable set is recursive in it? Post
himself thought not, but it was not until young Friedberg came along that
anyone had the proof.

Can you imagine a mass-market magazine publishing such a thing today? Perhaps
it's unnecessary, since anyone interested in computability theory probably
pays attention to blogs like Scott Aaronson's.

There's a quote from from Gödel later in the article that may also speak to
the problem of popularization:

| "Unfortunately," says Czech-born Kurt Godel of the institute, "he wants to
study medicine. An achievement like this at his age comes only once in a
lifetime.

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icandoitbetter
Hofstadter.

------
chriswoodford
does this mean that i should get one of those friar tuck cloaks, a copy of
PoEAA, and start preaching about martin fowler on street corners?

------
btilly
The thesis that nobody has every popularized any branch of science is wrong.
There used to be a tradition of having seminal books like _The Origin of the
Species_ being aimed at being understandable to a large audience of educated
people. And books in that vein still do appear, for instance _Guns, Germs and
Steel_ is both a popular book and a serious academic work.

~~~
timwiseman
You have a point, but keep in mind that some very relevant things have
changedsince then. Two to consdier:

1\. At that time (roughly 1859), the percentage of the population that was
considered educated is much smaller than it is now, and many of those in the
educated class where indepently wealthy (or directly sponsored by someone who
was) and had little expectation on them other than to be educated.

2\. Knowledge was much was less specialized then than it is now. I have been
told that it is not uncommon now for a number theorist to have a hard time
explaining the details of his work to someone who had specialized in analysis,
much less to members of the "large audience of educated people."

------
iopuy
"Bohr was God, and Oppenheimer was his prophet"

Physics has had its share of prophets. If you care to learn more about one
read "American Prometheus: The Triumph and Tragedy of J. Robert Oppenheimer."
Superb book, winner of the Pulitzer prize.

