Since the author is open up front about their OCD issues, this talk immediately came to mind. It's a bit of an elaborate tongue-in-cheek joke, but I found it personally helpful for thinking about why a choose a language. Pervert in this context does not mean sexual deviancy. In the Lacanian sense, a pervert is a person who enjoys being a vessel of the rules.
The Pervert's Guide to Computer Programming Languages - SXSW
The Pervert's Guide to Computer Programming Languages
Psychoanalysis and Software
What are the issues with selecting a programming language?
• Which programming language should we choose?
- Just saying: 'use the right tool for the job' begs the question
• Why are there over 1000 programming languages?
• How do we critique a programming language?
• Why do language designers create new programming languages?
• Rational reasons
• Maximize expression while modeling:
• a specific problem
• a broad range of problems
• Psychoanalysts: "Many decisions are not rational"
• Programming language choice can be rational, non-rational, or a mix
• Use Jacques Lacan and Slavoj Zizek's critical theory
• Critique non-rational decisions
• Discover ulterior motives (ours and others)
• Explain the diversity of language options
Jacques Lacan
• French psychoanalyst and philosopher
• Extremely cryptic
• Preoccupied with desire and enjoyment
• Popularized the mirror image, the Big Other, and the triad of the Imaginary. the Symbolic. and the Real
• Believes all humans fall into the three basic mental structures of psychosis, perversion, and neurosis
Why the 'Pervert's Guide'?
• Based on the Pervert's Guide to Ideology by Slavoj Zizek
• Pervert is a person who enjoys being a vessel of the rules.
• Zizek calls the analyst's method of discourse the pervert's discourse
• The analyst sits in the position of the object of desire for the subject.
• The analysand projects his or her ideals onto the analyst (transference)
• When we analyze programming languages we are operating in the analyst's (i.e. pervert's) discourse.
I re-watched it since I am once again thinking about programming languages
17:15 "Slavoj Zizek likes to say that obsessional activity is doing something in order to do nothing" which to me sounds like pursuing a goal without ever wanting to achieve it, liking the pursuit more.
41:10 C++ is an obsessive language
So by this measure, Izzy Muerte developed a effective strategy for themselves, since they are a self-described obsessive working in an obsessive language and says they wasted 10 years of their life on C++ while accomplishing very little. So, success?
I laughed at this point at 34:55 "Closure is what I call the ultimate perversion language" because Rich Hickey comes across to me as a subversive disciplinarian (no offense intended)
The Pervert's Guide to Computer Programming Languages - SXSW
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZyvIHYn2zk