!!Con 2020 - Programming from an alternate timeline! by Matthew Dockrey
4Programming from an alternate timeline! by Matthew Dockrey
We take ANDs and ORs for granted, but for millennia there was only the IMPLIES of classical Aristotelian syllogisms. It wasn’t until the 19th century that mathematical logic started to emerge, and it was a long time before it looked anything like what we use today. In 1879, Gottlob Frege published a gloriously weird notation system using branching lines, concavities and judgments. Sadly, no one else ever adopted it – in our timeline. Notation developed along less interesting lines here. But I wanted to see what programming would have been like had Frege won out, so I turned his notation into a working language. Doing so taught me just how different it is to approach problems with implication as your only logical operator, and it left me with a much deeper appreciation of our humble ANDs and ORs.
Matthew Dockrey is a Seattle-area industrial artist with a particular interest in kinetic sculpture of all scales. The history of technology provides the inspiration for much of his work, as well as exploring the beauty of mechanical design. His work has been featured on the Discovery Channel, displayed at Greenwich Observatory in London, and was selected to adorn the 2015 Hugo Award. His large-scale kinetic sculptures can be found at Burning Man, and his public art can increasingly be found in cities around the Pacific Northwest.