arrow_back What is the difference between mathematicians and computer scientists with respect to nomenclature?

Question

What is the difference between mathematicians and computer scientists with respect to nomenclature?

Answer 1

In contrast to computer people, mathematicians rarely make up words and phrases that describe our attitudes, behavior and mistakes. Computer programmers' informal jargon has many names for both productive and unproductive behaviors and attitudes involving programming, many of them detailed in [Raymond, 1991] (see "creationism", "mung" and "thrash" for example).

The mathematical community would be better off if we emulated them by greatly expanding our informal jargon in this area, particularly in connection with dysfunctional behavior and attitudes. Having a name for a phenomenon makes it more likely that you will be aware of it in situations where it might occur and it makes it easier for a teacher to tell a student what went wrong. This is discussed in [Wells, 1995].