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Why MIT switched from Scheme to Python (2009)

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284 points borski | 3 comments | 25 Jul 25 16:38 UTC | HN request time: 0.203s | source
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MontyCarloHall ◴[25 Jul 25 17:23 UTC] No.44685710[source]▶
Isn't this just part of the broader trend of CS departments switching away from teaching computer science to teaching computer engineering, which in turn is part of the more general trend of colleges becoming more vocational?

LISP dialects like Scheme are excellent for teaching pure computer science because they are the closest thing to executing lambda calculus expressions. Whereas Python is excellent for teaching applied computer engineering, because it's essentially executable pseudocode for imperative languages, and imperative languages are the most common language a computer engineer encounters in the real world.

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1. souldzin ◴[25 Jul 25 17:41 UTC] No.44685939[source]▶
Are functional languages more computer science than imperative languages?
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2. remexre ◴[25 Jul 25 17:46 UTC] No.44685997[source]▶
Formal reasoning about functional programs in terms of their (denotational) semantics is normal in a functional programming class (e.g. it's about a quarter of our mandatory-for-undergrads FP course).

Formal reasoning about imperative programs in terms of their (e.g. axiomatic) semantics is only in a grad-level course, and the programs you can reason about are really, really limited compared to the functional ones. (The last time I TA'd the FP class, one of the homeworks involved proving a simple compiler correct. When I took the grad course, I think the most complicated program we proved correct was selection sort.)

I think "reasoning about programs" is more computer-science than "writing programs," and choosing an imperative language signals that you're not emphasizing the former.

3. dehrmann ◴[26 Jul 25 01:29 UTC] No.44690497[source]▶
It's one way of modelling the broad notion an algorithm, but it isn't the only one, and it's odd to treat it as the one true expression of computer science when essentially all modern computing follows a different model.