> Wouldn’t a language designed for vibe coding naturally dispense with much of what is convenient and ergonomic for humans in favor of what is convenient and ergonomic for machines? Why not have it just write C? Or hell, why not x86 assembly?
Or why not just produce a binary directly?
It seems we've just invented a compiler.
The idea that child brains are better at learning languages is a myth. Adults struggle with languages because traditional language education is not fit for purpose. If you took a child and isolated them in such a way that they never got comprehensible input, and instead only gave them traditional language lessons (think textbooks, grammar drills) - they too would struggle. The good news is that if you take an adult and give them comprehensible input like you would a child, they will learn at least as effectively as a child.
What about pronunciation? Many of the assertions I've heard about adults in a foreign language is about our ability to recognize, differentiate, and reproduce the different phonemes, many which do not exist in our language.
These phonemes are even more difficult to recognize when we're not conversing face-to-face and in-person! So if you're listening to "comprehensible input" if it's on audio, or video voice-over, it is much inferior to seeing/feeling/hearing a native speaker make sound-shapes with their mouth!
I made many efforts to imitate my Spanish teachers in my youth, in terms of pronounciation, mouth shapes, accent and emphasis, etc. I credit the in-person instruction with achieving a nearly fluent comprehension and ability to make myself understood.
So the argument goes: if an adult is set in their ways and knows a particular set of phonemes, (or even tones, etc.) is it more difficult than a blank-slate child who has no prejudice about hearing and learning new sounds?
> if an adult is set in their ways and knows a particular set of phonemes, (or even tones, etc.) is it more difficult than a blank-slate child who has no prejudice about hearing and learning new sounds?
The answer is sort of "yes". If an adult is set in their ways and knows a particular set of phonemes, they will have a more difficult time with the phonemes of a new language than an infant would.
However, "learning new sounds" is not a correct way to think about it. You're born knowing all the sounds. You unlearn the differences between certain ones. If you, as an adult, have unlearned a difference that matters in your target language (because it didn't matter in your native language), you will have trouble with that difference. An infant can't have this problem.
Note that the cutoff point where an immersed child will fail to learn the pronunciation of a new language "automatically" is somewhere in the late teens, though.
Comprehensible input does seem to be the most effective way. i.e. get a lot of input that is only slightly beyond your current level (i+1).
I'm learning Ukrainian and there is a podcast "Ukrainian Lessons Podcast". Seasons 4-6 are not so much lessons but more just discussions about life, history, culture in 100% slow comprehensible Ukrainian. In one of the episodes Anna talks about how she spent most of her life getting English lessons at school and university, but still couldn't use the language freely. Finally, she watched Friends and by the time she'd finished every season, she felt she at last had a good command of English.
Sitcoms are good because they depict a lot of everyday situations, are rich in dialogue (i.e. real language people use daily), and there is a lot of slang and cultural references. Of course, you first need to develop enough of a base in the language to understand what's going on.
Sitcoms are a tried and true language promotion tactic. I remember when I was young there was a French teenage-sitcom, "Helene", which my mother would watch because her students watched it religiously (she was a language teacher). It was outrageously soapy, but even I noticed the relatively accessible language. My mother told me the show was a subsidized export of France's language evangelization program. Apparently teaching French was a lot easier when that show was popular.
Friends wasn't that, but close enough. I think I recall Simone Giertz saying that she learned English from it, and I can't be the only one who has noticed that there's something uncannily Lisa Kudrow-like about her stage persona.
You can find a lot (all?) of the Hélène et les Garçons episodes on YouTube, too.
Another good "sitcom-like" that you can find on YouTube is extr@. It's cheesy, but it's entertaining enough for what it is, and they have it for French, German, and Spanish (and English). Interestingly, it's the same main actor for French, German, and Spanish, a Dutch actor playing an American, while the rest of the cast changes around him.
There's something charming about old language learning shows, both overt and "covert" ones like Hélène et les Garçons. I remember Muzzy in Gondoland, BBC's English language teaching cartoon from the 80s.
I wonder why language learning apps aren't more into making entertainment in the language they're proselytizing these days.
For me it was because I dabbled in Russian before, but recent events have led me to avoid anything that could be seen as supporting Russia in any way, including culturally.
I also learned that a number of things I thought was Russian was in fact Ukrainian.
That's just sad to hear for me as a Russian. Russia and the Russian culture are a lot older than the current war and will still be around long after the war, but a lot of people just cannot draw a line between the two.
This is how it goes after any major war of aggression. Happened to Germany, Japan and USSR after the WW2. Germany and Japan are both generally seen in a favourable light now.
It seems that the reputation takes about two generations to recover once the hostilities are over and the country has started to reform. Russia never really attempted a real reform in the first place, so for it the outcome was different. Russia (and yes, the image of Russian culture) will obviously not come back from this disaster during our lifetimes.
You could argue that Russia successfully managed to sidestep reputational damage despite neo-imperialism/warmongering in the past, specifically with the Chechen wars.
I personally think this only worked out because it was easier to sell this as a civi-war-like internal conflict (and the situation was less obvious to other western nations than now). On the other hand, had the Ukraine invasion gone according to plan, I'm pretty confident that Russia could have managed at least a puppet government and lots of regional control at a manageable cost (in international reputation).
But it was very interesting to see how quickly the Ukraine war turned Russias image (at least in Europe) from "slightly crazy, badass" into overt contempt.
> But it was very interesting to see how quickly the Ukraine war turned Russias image (at least in Europe) from "slightly crazy, badass" into overt contempt.
I think this is because while much of the Europe was willing to 'turn the page' from 90s onwards, that changed during the 2008 war in Georgia. Since then there was enough attention in the media to the 'frozen conflicts' (Abkhazia, Transdnistria), then since 2014 we have the situation in Ukraine including MH17. Also how Russia dealt with its own political opposition. So in 2022 while the war itself was surprising, it did not require a total change of worldview to change the image of Russia.
It seems to me that Russia could've easily kept pretending to be a slightly flawed democracy, and it would've been super effective in hoodwinking "the west", but they "blew it" with obvious assassinations even before the Ukraine war.
This raises the question: Why would you ever admit to be totalitarian or a dictator if you have to deal (economically/diplomatically) with softhearted democracies which really hate that?
I think the answer is that just lying about this (to improve your reputation abroad) by itself hurts your local power base. Every signal in that direction undermines that image of strength that dictators rely on to keep in control, and no dictator can stay in power "against" the population because all the instruments to exert that power (prison/murder/army) rely themselves on (parts) of that population.
Totally agree. Even the 2014 invasion of Crimea didn't cause widespread anger in Europe towards Russia. And the Chechen wars were definitely seen as an internal event.
This war is different. My generation and the one growing up now will hostile to Russia for our lifetimes. No Russian culture will be willingly ingested, no Russian products will be willingly purchased. I do hope that Ukraine manages to take that cultural spot though, including but not limited to changing all existing multilingual signs from Russian to Ukrainian.
> I personally think this only worked out because it was easier to sell this as a civi-war-like internal conflict (and the situation was less obvious to other western nations than now).
Then again Israel is annexing land and actively committing genocide and voicing any anger is seen a deeply antisemitic and completely taboo. You will see a reflexive assurance that you can not equate the people with the government and so on.
My point is not Whataboutism. I don't want to relativate any war crimes done by anyone. I don't criticize people that lost relatives in Ukraine for using dehumanizing language like calling Russian soldiers orks. For the growing racist rhetoric that says the Russian culture were inherently imperialistic.
You might reflexively try to figure out whose narrative I am trying to push. What is my angle? I am not sure if this works or is even possible but maybe try to reflect on why you do this. Isn't it because it clashes with your own narrative? Which is not something you are allowed to notice because the West has no narrative, you are the one who is objectively right, only other people have a narrative.
So why is Russia and Israel seen so differently? Because there is Western geopolitical interest that people do so.
> So why is Russia and Israel seen so differently?
When did Ukrainians terror bomb Russia for decades on end?
When did Ukrainian authorities pay people to kill Russian civilians?
When did Ukrainians cross the border to massacre Russians, rape and take hundreds of hostages and take bragging videos of it to share on WhatsApp and Telegram?
Gazans have done all this and those who do it have - until recently - been universally seen as heroes in Gaza although that is finally changing. Gazas official position is still that October 7th was a fantastic day but simultaneously just a small taste of what is to come.
Even those that acknowledge that 07th of October was a mistake seems to be more concerned about what it means for them than the fact that they killed over thousand innocent civilians, documented their own extreme sexual violence and bragged openly about it and took hundreds of hostages.
Ukrainians did terrorize the Donbass for years. They bombed the cities, tried to ban the Russian language, committed a horrible massacre on Odessa where they murdered many trade unionists and so on.
Ukrainian use cluster ammunition that has been internationally banned because it leads to extreme civilian causalities. They have formations of "idiologically-motivated" soldiers that are literally neo-nazis.
I am repeating the Russian narrative here? Yeah, this is how you framed the Palestinian struggle.
The genocide that Israel is committing did not start as a reaction to the terror. The terror was a reaction to the goal of Israel to eradicate the Palestinian people. Gaza has been an open air prison for decades.
And no I am not defending any war crimes from anyone. But it matters who the victim and and who the aggressor is. The aggressor is Israel. Palestinians have a right to exist.
> So why is Russia and Israel seen so differently?
Israel had more accumulated goodwill left to burn though. Russia was on thin ice after Abkhazia, Crimea, etc. Israel was basically seen positively beforehand.
It's not infinite. A year ago it was basically only Muslim countries, some UN observers and the odd outlier like Ireland or Spain that were criticising Israel. But we've had in recent times the leaders of the UK and Germany criticising Israeli actions, and a decent number of mainstream US politicians even too. Israel is at serious risk of burning through as much goodwill in 2023-2026 as Russia did in 2008-2022.
The goodwill was because it was and is an geo-strategic partner of the West.
Israel has never garnered any goodwill from a humanitarian perspective. Gaza has long before been described as an open air prison. Israel itself as an apartheid nation. It has illegally annexed Syrian territory. Israel was never a beacon of humanity.
Israel is facing a ton of backlash for the latest conflict too (even from countries like Germany!).
But I would argue that in the Ukraine war it is much more obvious who "good guy/bad guy" is, because you have a totalitarian aggressor on one side and a somewhat democratic defender on the other.
In Israel, you have a democratically controlled army vs a terrorists group (Hamas), and it is much less clear where the justifiable limit for collateral damage is or whom to blame primarily for the current level of escalation.
I don't think mandatory conscription/press-gangs are anywhere close to murder/rape of civilians (which there are well-documented cases on the Palestinian and Russian side).
Pressing young men into military service is not even on the same scale by comparison.
And its not just the rape/murder/looting thats the problem- its about how the perpetrators deal with it.
The harsh reality of war is that tragedies like that are hard to completely prevent even for a disciplined force, but if you can not even be arsed to prosecute escalations like that (and respond with obvious lies, denial and finger-pointing instead), you lose any moral high-ground.
My wife is Russian and we have close Ukrainian friends and Ukrainian neighbors. We often shop at a Ukrainian grocery store. Her dentist is Ukrainian. It’s never been an issue. She spent many vacations as a child in Ukraine and obviously doesn’t support the war. She still loves her country. We watch Russian classics and I learned how to cook Russian dishes for her. It’s wild to me that people who are neither Ukrainian nor Russian take such extreme positions of canceling an entire nation when not even Ukrainians themselves do.
Some also don't really want to draw a line, because the current war is not an exception, it's fully in character with the past 200 or so years of Russian behavior. In the 90s and later some thought it's going to be better, but I think most people can see now nothing has changed for the better and Russian culture does not reflect any sort of guilt and shame like the Germans did.
That's a narrative. Over my life, I've seen 4 regimes and heard about a dozen historical narratives about the particular place I was born in, each radically different from the others and exaggerated to ridiculous proportions. Enough to understand that they're all mostly nonsense. One massive red flag is dealing in absolutes, another is "it's always been like that".
Sure, it's easy to dismiss anything as 'narrative, therefore nonsense'. I will give you another narrative to dismiss: oil-rich countries are waging wars more often than oil-poor countries, and they are starting them when the oil price is high. Russia is an oil-rich country. And there are several other reasons why things are the way they are.
Ah yes the old 'and you are lynching negroes' defence deployed again because you can't face your failures. My country was occupied by the Soviet Army, many people killed and whole society destroyed, and all of that for nothing. Did we hear an apology, admission of guilt, anything, not only from the Russian heads of state but from artists etc? Of course not.
And let me expand on the 'and all of that for nothing'. The Americans brought us prosperity. To some other countries, they brought misery. I'm not a fan of that. But at least it's very clear they are doing it for the money, that when someone is exploited, someone else is going to be rich. Eventually the exploited people or even whole countries can get rich too if they are smart, like South Korea.
Now contrast that with the Russian imperialism. Not only are they not bringing prosperity anywhere, they also can't manage to create prosperity back home. They plundered Eastern Europe for decades, they have vast natural resources, whole country could live very comfortable life. Instead there is a very small group of people living luxurious life until the next upheaval when they are going to flee into exile or be killed, and a bigger group of people living a mostly comfortable life mostly in big cities. The rest are essentially serfs that are also sent to the war to be killed. Maybe this war will end soon and another will start in a few years. Maybe the oil price will go down and there will be no money for a new war, which means there will be even less monery for the serfs. And all of this for nothing, it does not advance the society, it doesn't do anything good, it's just evil people playing their games. That's why what we really want is to be as far away from Russia as possible.
I'm sorry if I didn't make myself clear. You don't have any problems with imperialism or wars, when you're not targeted by them personally or even can get some benefit out of them, which is normal human behavior. This is why I don't see why the war in Ukraine is any different. If the war in Iraq did not change what people in, say, South America felt about the American culture, then why is the war in Ukraine supposed to have more impact on the same people and their attitude towards the Russian culture? And I'm sad if it does.
> You don't have any problems with imperialism or wars, when you're not targeted by them personally
I do. And I don't agree it's normal human behavior - normal human behavior is also to feel some empathy for people you have never met. Or even for animals.
> If the war in Iraq did not change what people in, say, South America felt about the American culture
It did. Can't speak for South America (who probably have a more balanced view already) but it definitely changed the perception of American culture in Europe.
> why is the war in Ukraine supposed to have more impact on the same people and their attitude towards the Russian culture?
Every day the news are full of Russian indiscriminately killing Ukrainian civilians, children in their sleep, the Russian society is quiet about that or even cheering, and you are asking why that should have any impact on our attitude towards the Russian culture?
I used to really want to learn Russian language. I thought of it as an investment in my career as I expected to work a lot more with Russians and Russian companies because I assumed Russia like the Baltics and Poland would become part of Europe.
I have also had some really nice and smart colleagues from Russia over the years.
Then came 2014 and 2022 and now sadly I think Russians will go through what Germans experienced from 1946 and the next few decades.
Hopefully you'll not go through what Germans suffered in 1945.
If you are working against the regime we are still friends.
And I look forward to visit Russia again in a decade or two.
But remember (and everyone should remember this): a people is responsible for the government they choose. Those who cheer when their militaries are successfully attacking peaceful neighbors and taking civilians including kids as hostages and talk about erasing their neighbors can't expect much sympathy when the war returns home.
Exactly this. I remember when it was just a couple small links in a yellow banner you could scroll past. Same with YouTube, the ads used to just be a banner under or beside the video but didn't interfere with the main content.
Once the ads got invasive, I installed ublock and haven't looked back. I don't feel the slightest bit guilty about that.
I had no problem with ads when they were just a banner next to the video.
Now youtube is borderline unusable without an ad blocker.
That said they are free to try and stop me, and I am free to continue using ublock.
So many of the so-called "C alternatives" end up doing way too much. I don't need algebraic data types or classes or an integrated build system or a package manager.
What I would like to see is a language that is essentially just C with the major design flaws fixed.
Remove the implicit casting and obscure integer promotions. Make spiral rule hold everywhere instead of being able to put const at the beginning of the declaration. Make `sizeof()` return a signed type. Don't allow mixed signed/unsigned arithmetic. Make variables/functions private by default i.e. add `public` to make public instead of `static` to make private.
Keep the preprocessor and for the love of god make it easy to invoke the compiler/linker directly so I can write my own Makefile.
Arguably, what you describe, is closer to what C2 was/is[1]. By the way, C2 is still alive, for those that care to look.
C3 (link[2]) is a fork of/inspired by C2, which appears to have incorporated a lot of Odin and Jai "flavoring". In the case of both C3 and Odin, it can be argued that part of their popularity is that Jai isn't publicly released. Consequently, they seem to pull in a lot of the crowd, that would be attracted to Jai. Another aspect of this, is the more C3 promotes itself (whether intentional or not), the more likely C2 will get faded out. Many will likely think C3 is the next iteration of C2 or simply know the name more, because pushed on HN and other social media.
Isn’t it a somewhat unfair characterization that ”C3 promotes itself more” and ”is pushed on HN and other social media” and that because of this C2 for some reason experiences harm?
C2 is over 11 years now. C3’s recent breakthrough this last half year is unlikely to have had much impact on its ability to grow the last 10 years.
This thread literally meets the definition of self-promotion. So no, don't think the characterization is unfair.
If your programming language had a different name, then I would agree, but it doesn't. Many will assume that C3 is the next iteration of C2 and that it's outdated, despite the fact that C2 is still in development.
While this rule has become somewhat diluted when C developed and gradually took on features from C++ (like types in function parameters), it's still very helpful to understand the guiding principle. (But those inconsistencies that crept in over time are also the reason why newer languages don't do that anymore).
What? Are there really people out there relying on libraries for every peripheral? I've never seen anyone use a third party library for peripherals like that, short of some prototyping on an Arduino or the like. It's always just drivers implemented from scratch.
Jup. This is my field of work. I am ot a full time embedded developer, I run an electronics workshop at an artschool. So a lot of arduino-ish things, and aometimes more sophisticated stuff. But I ain't got no time to write drivers.
I'm fine with paying for someone else to own the roof over my head. I've just prioritized keeping that cost as low as possible so I can do other things with my money.
> > The way I see it I'm going to be paying a mortgage either way. I'd rather it be my own than my landlord's.
> Why exactly?
Because if it is your mortgage, it has an end date. After that your housing costs drop dramatically. If you time it so that your housing costs drop dramatically near the time your income drops dramatically in retirement, it's a good combination.
I guess this one is a matter of perspective. I don't see a house as an asset in my life.
> 2) your cost of living falls dramatically
My cost of living was dramatically lower the whole time leading up to the point where the drop-off occurs for the homeowner. They only start catching up after decades.
Well, I see my house as my home. But I do know that if things ever got rough I could sell it and live somewhere cheaper with a good chunk of money left over. So it is an asset, even if you don't think of it like that on a daily basis.
Whether renting is cheaper than buying varies. In the short term it often is, but not always. There is generally a long term point where buying is cheaper - but again, not always! If you can do something else with the money you save renting, then good for you.
To put this on context, to rent a house in my street is only a tiny bit cheaper than a mortgage on it. So it would not make long term sense to rent unless you had no choice.
Or why not just produce a binary directly? It seems we've just invented a compiler.
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