Hi all,

From: "Richard A. O'Keefe" <ok at cs.otago.ac.nz>
>     They talk about excluding ideas, and think that just excluding words
>     is sufficient to do this.  THIS IS NOT A MATTER OF BETTER OR WORSE
>     THINKING.  Each kind of thinking is effective in its own sphere.

Any "Sphere" is a form and all its parts only mantains its existence.
The parts are elements OF the sphere.

You are right it is not better or worse thinking.
It is only politics, laws that force you to stay in the same sphere.

Smalltalk as a language. and variables.
How many time has you spend considering an alternative?

Where you see a computer language I see a virtual objects environment. [*]
Where you see variables, class templates and languages I see simply objects
and messages.
Where you see only objects I see more.

You are right when you explain that "love" = L+o+v+e but. there, I see more
than 4 characters.
"a system is more than its parts" and Smalltalk is more than a language
[**].

Yes!, Smalltalk has a language.
So you can DEFINE correct and closed systems (with classes as with C++).
But you can use smalltalk to BUILD open systems (with species & evolution)
if you know how to work with wholes (not only Object Oriented).

I understand all of the argumentation said about variables, languages and
classes; they are formal and simple. This arguments consider programming as
a human centered task; and place our activities inside the Science Sphere.
How many time has you spend considering an alternative?

Where you see a clean shirt. I also see the dirty water.
Where you only see aLanguage. I see the ghost in the machine ;-)
Where you see a class template. I see the gestation of a new been of a
species (not an instance of aClass [**] ).

Best,
Ale.

[*] Please take a look at the General Systems Theory (
http://www.bertalanffy.org ) and http://www.smalltalking.net (if you can
read Spanish)
[**] Haskell or VisualBasic are only languages, they do NOT support
evolution, they only support change.
[***] we do NOT have "Classes" in Smalltalk. we have Species ;-P


----- Original Message -----
From: "Richard A. O'Keefe" <ok at cs.otago.ac.nz>
To: <squeak-dev at lists.squeakfoundation.org>
Sent: Thursday, November 28, 2002 10:39 PM
Subject: Re: A big teacher wish


> Stephan Rudlof <sr at evolgo.de> wrote:
>     [stuff that had me purring]
>
> For me even #instanceVariableNames: in *meta* classes (accessible in the
> class pane of a browser) are a concept, which is easy to understand: each
> instance of the corresponding meta class (the class with its subclasses)
has
> its own class instance variable (which is then accessible like a class var
> in all of *its* instances). This concept highly corresponds to the concept
> of instance vars of instances of ordinary classes.
> What is difficult to understand here?
>
> 1.  First, there is an interface issue.  Setting class variable names is
>     done in the "instance" pane; setting class instance variable names is
>     done in the "class" pane.  If you don't already know what these
>     things are, it is far from obvious that
> FooBar class
>     instanceVariableNames: ''
>     is talking about a third kind of variable.  It is common for students
>     to think that it is an alternative interface for setting
>     class variable names.
>
> 2.  Second, to get your head around this, you have to be good at thinking
>     a particular way.  Just for now I'll call it "algebraic" thinking.
>     You have to be able to say to yourself, "what if I take this
literally?
>     What if I try to apply the 'instanceVariableNames' concept to the
>     'metaclass' concept?  OH, these things are like instance variables
>     but they belong to instances of the metaclass instead of instances
>     of the class."
>
>     Many people, as this thread has painfully demonstrated, DON'T think
>     that way.  They think in a "verbal analogy" way.  They are happy
>     using the same word for variables and the values of variables.
>     They talk about excluding ideas, and think that just excluding words
>     is sufficient to do this.  THIS IS NOT A MATTER OF BETTER OR WORSE
>     THINKING.  Each kind of thinking is effective in its own sphere.
>     A really good criminal lawyer, for example, will need to be very good
>     at both kinds of thinking:  "algebraic" thinking to understand
>     expert witnesses, "verbal" thinking to understand others and influence
>     the jury.  People are generally pretty imprecise in what they say,
>     leaving it to their (intelligent) hearer to figure out what they
>     really mean.  When you see transcripts of actual speech, it's
>     horrifying.  We're so good at figuring out at what people MEAN that
>     we don't pay much attention to what they SAY, as a rule.  So this
>     kind of thinking works WITH people.  It's highly persuasive, and it's
>     highly effective for dealing with the strange things people say.
>
>     This kind of thinking DOESN'T work with technology.  If you try to
>     tell an electric light bulb that 240 volts is pretty much the same
>     as 110 volts, it's all volts, just a few more of them, it isn't
>     going to be persuaded.  If you use the same word for a video cassette
>     as for a video cassette recorder, that doesn't alter the fact that one
>     of them plugs into a wall socket and the other doesn't.
>
>     So the thing that is difficult to understand here is that the
>     Squeak interface is using *technical* language *precisely*
>     and you should take it *literally*.
>
> It's very important, of course, that Squeak is not about preserving
> the status quo.  Squeak is a work in progress.  Just because Squeak
> currently uses certain terms and interfaces doesn't mean that _anyone_
> thinks those are the best terms or interfaces.  I for one am drooling
> at the thought of having Traits, and to use them the way you declare a
> class will _have_ to change somehow.
>
> One possibility, for example, would be to construct class declarations
> by drawing pictures.  UML diagrams are one possibility, although UML
> doesn't really fit Smalltalk all that well.  Perhaps one could find
> a ClassMorph, ask it to make a new subclass, edit the name, drop
> TraitsMorphs onto it, I don't know what.  Perhaps you would create
> a VariableMorph with a name box and a description box and drop that
> onto a ClassMorph.  I don't know.  Maybe Connectors can become a browser.
>
>
>