[Haskell-cafe] A Thought: Backus, FP, and Brute Force Learning

[OWP]

This thought isn't really related to Haskell specifically but it's more
towards FP ideal in general.

I'm new to the FP world and to get me started, I began reading a few
papers.  One paper is by John Backus called "Can Programming Be Liberated
from the von Neumann Style? A Functional Style and It's Algebra of
Programs".

While I like the premise which notes the limitation of the von Neumann
Architecture, his solution to this problem makes me feel queasy when I read
it.

For me personally, one thing I enjoy about a typical procedural program is
that it allows me to "Brute Force Learn".  This means I stare at a
particular section of the code for a while until I figure out what it
does.  I may not know the reasoning behind it but I can have a pretty
decent idea of what it does.  If I'm lucky, later on someone may tell me
"oh, that just did a gradient of such and such matrix".  In a way, I feel
happy I learned something highly complex without knowing I learned
something highly complex.

Backus seems to throw that out the window.  He introduces major new terms
which require me to break out the math book which then requires me to break
out a few other books to figure out which bases things using archaic
symbols which then requires me to break out the pen and paper to mentally
expand what in the world that does.  It makes me feel CISCish except
without a definition book nearby.  It's nice if I already knew what a
"gradient of such and such matrix" is but what happens if I don't?

For the most part, I like the idea that I have the option of Brute Force
Learning my way towards something.  I also like the declarative aspect of
languages such as SQL which let's me asks the computer of things once I
know the meaning of what I'm asking.  I like the ability to play and learn
but I also like the ability to declare this or that once I do learn.  From
Backus paper, if his world comes to a reality, it seems like I should know
what I'm doing before I even start.  The ability to learn while coding
seems to have disappeared.  In a way, if the von Neumann bottleneck wasn't
there, I'm not sure programming would be as popular as it is today.

Unfortunately, I'm still very new and quite ignorant about Haskell so I do
not know how much of Backus is incorporated in Haskell but so far, in the
start of my FP learning adventure, this is how things seem to be seen.

If I may generously ask, where am I wrong and where am I right with this
thought?

Thank you for any explanation

P.S.  If anyone knows of a better place I can ask this question, please
feel free to show me the way.
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