🚀 go-pugleaf

: From: hrubin@pop.stat.purdue.edu (Herman Rubin)
: Message-ID: <Bxv2t2.4FH@mentor.cc.purdue.edu>
: I have given examples.  Some have even introduced conflicts with previous
: notation in the computer field.  A brief repetition of some of them is in
: order.
:         The use of | for or. [...]
:         The use of ^ for exclusive or. [...]
:         using * for indirection, [...]
:         using & for  "address of", 
:         Even the use of ; as a statement end conflicts with mathematical
: 	notation almost two centuries old. 
: SOME of this may have been inadvertent, and due to the ignorance of those
: introducing the notation.  

Absolute rubbish.  In the first place, Herman's implied claim that only
programming notations overload symbols is blatantly false.  He waves
away some examples in making this claim (math vs physics in particular),
but there are dozens more, one particularly pervasive example of overloading
being the interpretation of juxtaposition, which has dozens of uses
in mathematics, biology, chemistry, and so on and on.  The claim that
programming notations are exceptional in their rate of notation overloading
is totally unjustified by the facts.  Notation conflicts in *all* fields,
even conflicts with formerly established usage in the *same* field,
are as common as dirt.

In the second place, Herman's claim that the above "notation conflicts"
or "obfuscations" are *intended* to conflict or obscure is just silly. 
It is fairly clear that the oritinators simply didn't *care* about the
conflict with notations used to express completely different concepts,
and were simply consuming characters from their palatte of available
characters without much *attention* to conflict or obfuscation, let
alone intent.  
--
Wayne Throop  ...!mcnc!dg-rtp!sheol!throopw