Re: Next generation COBOL?

2005-11-25 11:55:00 MET ..
2005-11-25 12:30:00 MET

"Steve Richfie1d" wrote:

> ...

>> No. That depends in which language you are most fluent,
>> and what kind of abstractions you use in thinking.
>
> I respectfully disagree. I am fluent in many computer languages, but I
> have NEVER been able to speed read any of them like well written COBOL.

I also respectfully disagree - I am also fluent in many computer
languages - and what the most understandable programs are depends,
of course, the currently most used languages - as for me, that is
(well written) C, at the moment, and from a more ojective standpoint,
Ada.

My Ada-experience, however, is 10 years old, so there is some
loss in the virtuosity with that language.

Thinking is a very subjective thing - much individual variations, and,
like it or not, thinking customs tend to solidify with advancing age.

> ...

>> If you were right, you could express the Schroedinger
>> Equation in plain English and make it more understandable
>> that way.
>
> This is a VERY complex area. Only certain things can be stated in any
> particular language, and these are DIFFERENT for different languages. A
> simple challenge is to take some English sentences and re-write them yet
> retain EXACTLY the same meaning. This is usually impossible, or at least
> impractical. For this reason, exact translations to foreign languages are
> usually IMPOSSIBLE.

Quite so. Worse: The same language means different thing to
different persons. All those of us who are/were married know that.

A problem not (yet?) shared by programming languages.

> ...

> As luck would have it, I have some experience programming the Schroedinger
> equation (working with Ira Karp) at the University of Washington Physics
> department many years ago! The problem is that the "equation" is NOT a
> formula and is quite ill behaved with many singularities, so that just
> plugging numbers into it quickly results in numerical exceptions. ...

You *never* work with the Schroedinger Equation on real
physical situations. There is no such thing as an "isolated system" in
quantum physics - the Schroedinger equation is defined on *all*
particles of a physical system - in fact, on *all* particles of the
universe. Such equation cannot be solved - one has to make
simplifications. And that is where the trouble comes in.

And that is, where Quantum Computers enter the stage.
Consider thousand QuBits. Each one can be expressed as

(a + ib) |0> + (c + id) |1>

Two complex amplitudes for each QuBit, 2000 amplitudes
for 1000 QuBits.

As a not isolated but entagled system, however, there are not
2000 different amplitudes but 2 to the power of 1000
different amplitudes - one amplitude for each possible
combination of QuBits. The evolution in time as
described by the Schroedinger Equation can be, in this case,
formuated as a unitary mapping of a Vector in Hilbert Space
of, in this case, a dimensionality of 2^1000.

That is a matrix-multiplication, and there are (2^1000)^2
matrix elements.

There is no computer and no programming language which
can do that. The only device to emulate a Quantum Computer
is another Quantum Computer.

Programming Languages for quantum Computers, however,
look very different from programming languages for
classical computation.

> ... In a real sense, it is there AS an explanation and NOT as an equation
> to be solved! We had to break it down into small pieces each expressed in
> 3 different ways, and go with the median results of the 3 methods for each
> piece!

So it is. But as far as explanation goes, practical application
give insight into explanation. As David Deutsch puts it:
Regarding the computing power of a Quantum Computer,
you have to answer the question: "Where does all this computation
take place?"

His (and my) answer is the Many Worlds Interpretation of
Quantum Mechanics - but this subject leaves the topic of this
newsgroup.

> ...

> Algebra was invented as a means of expression and manipulation to serve
> where natural languages failed.

Agreed.

> ... The parallels in computerdom would be one of the formula manipulation
> systems that people have developed.
>
> I could envision future COBOLeze statements like:
>
> X where X^2 - 3 = 6. would set X to +/-3

Sounds SQL-ish?

> ...

> (Note here the indefinite sign, which is part of several proposals
> (including mine) for better computer arithmetic than IEEE-754 floating
> point. MOST computations made by present floating point hardware now
> produce WRONG results! For example, 1.0/3.0 = 0.33 (observing
> significance), and NOT 0.33333333 as computers now universally claim. This
> underlies the inability of present climate and economic simulators to
> produce stable long-term results.)

I just put Many Worlds outside the topic of this newsgroup, but you
brought it back in here!

The basic inability to predict the future *does* *not* depend on
limited computing power - and it is not even possible with a
quantum-computer which simulates all of reality. The reason is
that there is not a single future but an ever branching tree of
futures. A Quantum Computer could compute those simulations
correctly but would *also* yield the different futures - you would
have to select one of the simulated futures if you want to have
a definite answer.

And the answer is correct only in one instance of your own future!

There is *no* way to predict a future - because there is
always a bunch of futures! - Well - one way there is: If you
find yourself in a future which you don't like (bad weather
or something), kill yourself. This way, you live only in
futures you like!

One needs a certain trust in Quantum Physics for this sort
of safe weather prediction!

> Perhaps this sort of capability COULD merge complex math and natural
> language. The whole goal of my posting is to "flush out" what would be
> needed for such a new language to succeed, and this might indeed help.
>
> Thanks for your thoughts.

Actually, my employer pays me for thinking about COBOL and related
subjects.

Herwig


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