TITLE: Brilliance Is Better Than Magic, Because You Get To Learn It
AUTHOR: Eugene Wallingford
DATE: May 27, 2016  1:38 PM
DESC: 
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BODY:
Brent Simmons has recently suggested that Swift would be better
if it were more dynamic.  Some readers have interpreted his
comments as an unwillingness to learn new things.  In
<A HREF="http://inessential.com/2016/05/25/oldie_complains_about_the_old_old_ways">
   Oldie Complains About the Old Old Ways</A>,
Simmons explains that new things don't bother him; he simply
hopes that we don't lose access to what we learned in the
previous generation of improvements.  The entry is short and
worth reading in its entirety, but the last sentence of this
particular paragraph deserves to be etched in stone:

<BLOCKQUOTE><EM>
 It seemed like magic, then.  I later came to understand how it
 worked, and then it just seemed like brilliance.  (Brilliance
 is better than magic, because you get to learn it.)
</EM></BLOCKQUOTE>

This gets to close to the heart of why I love being a computer
scientist.

So many of the computer programs I use every day seem like magic.
This might seem odd coming from a computer scientist, who has
learned how to program and who knows many of the principles that
make complex software possible.  Yet that complexity takes many
forms, and even a familiar program can seem like magic when I'm
not thinking about the details under its hood.

As a computer scientist, I get to study the techniques that make
these programs work.  Sometimes, I even get to look inside the
new program I am using, to see the algorithms and data structures
that bring to life the experience that feels like magic.

Looking under the hood reminds me that it's not really magic.  It
isn't always brilliance either, though.  Sometimes, it's a very
cool idea I've never seen or thought about before.  Other times,
it's merely a bunch of regular ideas, competently executed, woven
together in a way that give an illusion of magic.  Regular ideas,
competently executed, have their own kind of beauty.

After I study a program, I know the ideas and techniques that make
it work.  I can use them to make my own programs.

This fall, I will again teach a course in compiler construction.
I will tell a group of juniors and seniors, in complete honesty,
that every time I compile and execute a program, the compiler
feels like magic to me.  But I know it's not.  By the end of the
semester, they will know what I mean; it won't feel like magic to
them any more, either.  They will have learned how their compilers
work.  And that is even better than the magic, which will never go
away completely.

After the course, they will be able to use the ideas and techniques
they learn to write their own programs.  Those programs will
probably feel like magic to the people who use them, too.
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