Romance of the Programmer

This was something I wrote a long time ago, that I still somewhat agree with.

After the break :U.





There's a certain nostalgia about coding. In my head I have the vision of an almost completely Romanticized programmer. Hunched over a keyboard with the only light from the computer, working on little sleep, blanket draped over his back.

I am in no way a programmer, but I like to think that I might have a bit of the Programmer's Romance. You love your code and algorithms so much, that you give up your life for it. Needing nothing but a computer and your mind. Going days on end, with no social life. Just the poetry of the Programmer's Romance seems pretty awesome to me. I don't know how to explain it.

I guess in a way, there's probably a Mathematician's Romance. Hunched over a paper, crying because they aren't fucking creative enough to think up a solution. Heh, there an old truthful saying, "Every problem in mathematics can be solved by trial and error." So, whenever the teacher asks how to solve such-and-so, I'll usually respond with that uncreative response. I'll do it in a lot of my proofs too, it tends to be the way I think. My proofs are typically, unfortunately, by uncreative exhaustive cases.

There's a notion in the Mathematical community (and in the Programmer's community also....they're rather similar) of an aesthetic value for a proof (code for a programmer). That the proof must be efficient, quick, and small (same with the programmer's code). I think for one of the color theorems there was a (correct) computer-aided proof that one of the professors objected, "This isn't a proof! It's a telephone directory!"

But to continue the analogy, the Mathematician's Romance is very similar. Only it extends to far more ancient times. But, I don't really think of the Mathematician in the Programmer's Picture.

It's mainly because of the tales of these Mathematician's being so much more physically active than the Programmers.....there are a lot of stories of Mathematician Playboys actually. (the Chinese mathematician that came up with the Chinese remainder theorem had a portion of his.....pretty much a fucking mansion I believe.....devoted to random mistresses, dancers, and 'musicians'). Galois got into a duel because of a love affair. Another European mathematician slept with the fucking Queen I believe, Hell, Euler had some crazy amount of children. Then, of course, "A Beautiful Mind"'s line, "Hey, speaking of exchanging fluids...."

So, when I try to envision the Mathematician's Romance in place of the Programmer's Romance.....it ends up being one where they leave the desk, get hammered, and fuck a gal; but this is the Boone Romance. In the end, all motivation is struck. And it might explain my willingness to program rather than write up the outline of my Goldbach Conjecture proof.

As far as reflecting yet again on the similarities between mathematicians and programmers. From what I have seen, a lot of the problems are very similar. Start with a base set of axioms/functions and build a theorem/program from there. The steps of analytical thinking are incredibly similar, and I find when I make my shitty programs I feel as if I'm thinking the exact same way as if I'm writing up a proof.

The people are very similar too, there's a 'romance' of the programmer, which holds almost a troubadour-esque like quality in its telling that is much akin to the coffee to theorem mathematician machines today.

However, the point is that it's not only important to create a theorem, but the theorem itself has to be in an important area. A computer can create millions, trillions of useless theorems, whether they are useful is up to the mathematical community. For this reason, it might be entirely plausible: make a computer that will on the one hand randomly apply theorems and logic processes to create new theorems in a theory, and for the moment allow new theories to be developed by mathematicians, and finally just apply an evolutionary algorithm. A tick mark for every 'useful' theorem, and hope that it will find theorems of the caliber mathematicians are looking for. I believe there is a computer already doing this, but eh. A theory-building computer can be built much the same way.

Oh, right, introspective. I was wondering whether my lack of recent progress is really true or not. However, it's not the same when I don't have this work. Maybe it has gotten to the point where this certain kind of work has achieved a nigh holy point that is untenable for any other kinds of work.