Re: Another nail in the coffin

I have to agree with Tim.  Libraries may have thie problems, but this is
hardly a nail in the coffin.  Yes, Alpha is interesting, and it may find its
niche.  But this just Steve Wolfram being Steve Wolfram.  Every few years
he's given to making grand pronouncements proceeded with much drum-rolling
about whatever paradigm-shifting project he happens to be working on.

To be fair, Mathematica is useful software and NKOS has interesting insights
into using finite automata as a way of understanding how the world works.
I'll withhold real judgement until I try my own questions on Alpha, but so
far this looks like classic Wolfram showmanship.

Peter Schlumpf
www.avantilibrarysystems.com

On 5/3/09, Tim Spalding <tim <at> librarything.com> wrote:
>
> Count me in as a Wolfram Alpha naysayer. A "computable almanac" isn't
> that useful, and its not a "step" to anything. Seemingly minor
> increases in the intellectual complexity of a question require
> astronomically better data, data models and algorithms, if they are
> even possible to "compute." The answer, if there is an answer, lies in
> Norvig's "unreasonable effectiveness of data,"[1] not in any
> combination of "curated" data and "millions of lines of code."
>
> Just an opinion!
>
> Tim
>
> [1]
> http://googleresearch.blogspot.com/2009/03/unreasonable-effectiveness-of-data.html