Thanks for the feedback. >An interesting angle to ponder is how Lisp and the Human Mind share > linked lists as a basic data structure. Remember how you had memorized > the ABC?
That's true - even though my recollection of the alphabet is patchy, letters always occur in groupings. Specifically, 'ABC', 'PQR', 'MN', and 'XYZ' seem to stand out immediately. Possibly because they are often used as math variables. When trying to recollect a position of a different letter than those my brain does a 'neighborhood search' (linked lists)! > FP taught me how you can also build other data structures out of > linked lists, skip lists anyone? This one could easily become a theme for a separate blog entry. I've come to the shocking realization that Computer Science education has this thing backwards. Sure, they encourage modularity and composability when it comes to OO programming. Some enlightened souls might mention the Unix philosophy of "small components, loosely coupled" (short, focused functions, etc). But no-one in the world talks about data structure composability! Yet data structures are lower in the complexity hierarchy than objects. If being compos-able is a virtue in programming, why not start at the lower levels and demonstrate how basic data structures can produce more complex ones? The CompSci books are even worse - they jump straight ahead into the Abstract Data Type, so they lead with generalization and leave the details blurred. You really have to become a member of a semi-underground programming community to see the light here. Incredible. Cheers, James On May 10, 2:46 pm, Herwig Hochleitner <hhochleit...@gmail.com> wrote: > Good article, thanks for sharing! > > An interesting angle to ponder is how Lisp and the Human Mind share > linked lists as a basic data structure. Remember how you had memorized > the ABC? > FP taught me how you can also build other data structures out of > linked lists, skip lists anyone? > Now take a look at the steps your mind takes, when finding the > successor of a particular letter in the alphabet :) > > cheers -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Clojure" group. To post to this group, send email to clojure@googlegroups.com Note that posts from new members are moderated - please be patient with your first post. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to clojure+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/clojure?hl=en
