Nice idea, but I doubt it. I think Perl will always be around, despite what Python advocates say.

I certainly hope not. That would imply that centuries or millenia hence, we won't have a decent artificial intelligence yet. Hopefully, in hundreds or thousands of years, we'll have a higher level language with which to communicate with computers than Perl. A sufficiently powerful computer should be able to optimize it's own code to solve problems: given a reasonable understanding of human desires (a hard problem), and how those desires are stated (another hard problem), a computer should be able to generate code to solve that problem.

To an extent, we do this already with existing programming languages: optimizing compilers generate assembly language that no human wrote, and genetic algorithms have created circuits that no human engineer could ever design (or maintain).

If Perl is the best we can do, then I'd just as soon give up now. Perl is useful, but it's a long way from the optimum interface to advanced technology.
--
AC

In reply to Re^4: Update: Teaching Perl in the Humanities by Anonymous Monk
in thread Update: Teaching Perl in the Humanities by cyocum

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