Steven D'Aprano wrote:
Nobody talking about (say) Solitaire on a computer would say:
"Blat the pixels in the rect A,B,C,D to the rect E,F,G,H. That will free
up the Ace of Spades and allow you to memcopy the records in the far
right column of the tableau into the foundation."
but when it comes to high-level computer languages like Python, we do the
equivalent *all the time*.
I find exception to that argument. That is an example of the bogus
analogy fallacy. (I am offering this in friendship, actually). The two
cases have nothing to do with one another, do not affect one another
directly or indirectly, and are not helpful for comparison sake.
Analogies are generally not helpful in discussion and ought to be
avoided generally... except for entertainment sake... and frankly I have
found many of your analogies most entertaining (and creative) !
Second point, we seldom do anything *all the time* / this is a
fallacy that presupposes extreme references, as we think about the
argument; extreme exageration is not helpful... may or may not be
rightly extreme, and may or may not be relevant.
What can be said (about the argument) is that we sometimes waste
time arguing over abstraction layers with limited cross-dependent
understanding.
(I include myself in this.)
(myself, as well) ... the humility is appreciated.
And people get
into (often angry) arguments over definitions, when what they're really
arguing about is what is happening at different abstraction levels.
Sometimes. More often than not, folks are not really angry (I am
seldom angry at my computer terminal... its one of the places where I
relax, learn, communicate, and relate with other computer scientists who
enjoy what they do because its enjoyable. I do agree with you that we
all sometimes talk past each other because we're arguing from within a
'different' level of abstraction.
kind regards,
m harris
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