Bret Victor writes:
The power to understand and predict the quantities of the world should not be restricted to those with a freakish knack for manipulating abstract symbols.
When most people speak of Math, what they have in mind is more its mechanism than its essence. This “Math” consists of assigning meaning to a set of symbols, blindly shuffling around these symbols according to arcane rules, and then interpreting a meaning from the shuffled result. The process is not unlike casting lots.
This mechanism of math evolved for a reason: it was the most efficient means of modeling quantitative systems given the constraints of pencil and paper. Unfortunately, most people are not comfortable with bundling up meaning into abstract symbols and making them dance. Thus, the power of math beyond arithmetic is generally reserved for a clergy of scientists and engineers (many of whom struggle with symbolic abstractions more than they’ll actually admit).
We are no longer constrained by pencil and paper. The symbolic shuffle should no longer be taken for granted as the fundamental mechanism for understanding quantity and change. Math needs a new interface.
A deeply interesting post that argues that Math needs a new interface, one more accessible to more people.
Since computers can present mathematical concepts and operations in visual representations.
Ironic the same computers gave rise to impoverished and difficult to use (for most people) representations of semantics.
Moving away from the widely adopted, easy to use and flexible representations of semantics in natural languages.
Do we need an old interface for semantics?