[Haskell-cafe] Random ramble

[Andrew Coppin]

[You may want to just hit delete now? ;-) ]


I don't know where everybody else is, but where I live, we have various 
science programs on TV from time to time. (Horizon being a fairly 
regular one.) They grab a bunch of eggheads, and try to get them to 
explain (in soundbites) some topic or other. Sometimes it's string 
theory, or quantum dynamics, or chaos theory, or something like that. 
(And sometimes it's economics - and then I change channel.) Usually the 
producers go to great lengths to make the subject seem "interesting" - 
that is, try to be as over-dramatic as possible. Often accompanied with 
copious computer graphics, which mainly just look pretty.

Anyway, I was sitting here thinking to myself "hey, what if they got a 
bunch of people to talk about Haskell?" (That's *one* way to get 
publicity...!)

I don't know how many of you are as neurotically familiar with The 
Matrix as I am, but... I found myself visualising that scene from about 
mid-way through the film.

Morpheus: "This may feel... a little weird."

[6 inch metal plug injected into the back of Neo's skull]

Neo: "AAAAAAAAAAARRGH!!"

[They turn on the computer.]

[Neo finds himself floating in a sea of lambda functions, higher-kinded 
class instances and parametric polymorphism.]

...and then I find myself thinking of http://xkcd.com/c224.html



Erm... OK, I'll go sit in the corner and be quiet now.