Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
Letting Go of Control
Part 2/2 Season Finale
Didier Verna
1/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
Previously in: “Letting go of control”. . .
Our software was out of control
This was only going to get worse
We were afraid
We were ashamed
2/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
But today, everything’s going to be fine
Our software behave like biological realms
Biological organisms are autonomous
Our software needs to
be autonomous!
We should not control it
We should give it the means to control
itself instead
3/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
But today, everything’s going to be fine
Our software behave like biological realms
Biological organisms are autonomous
Our software needs to
be autonomous!
We should not control it
We should give it the means to control
itself instead
3/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
What you don’t know about GC
The recursive definition of
differentiation made no provision for
erasure of abandoned list structure.
No solution was apparent at the time,
but the idea of complicating the
elegant definition of differentiation with
explicit erasure was unattractive.
– John McCarthy (1978)
4/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
The rules of good parenthood
1 Don’t be too possessive
Don’t control everything
2 Let the teenage crisis pass
Bugs and errors are good!
3 Help your software grow an adult
Give it free will
4 Use Lisp
5/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
The rules of good parenthood
1 Don’t be too possessive
Don’t control everything
2 Let the teenage crisis pass
Bugs and errors are good!
3 Help your software grow an adult
Give it free will
4 Use Lisp
5/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
The rules of good parenthood
1 Don’t be too possessive
Don’t control everything
2 Let the teenage crisis pass
Bugs and errors are good!
3 Help your software grow an adult
Give it free will
4 Use Lisp
5/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
The rules of good parenthood
1 Don’t be too possessive
Don’t control everything
2 Let the teenage crisis pass
Bugs and errors are good!
3 Help your software grow an adult
Give it free will
4 Use Lisp
5/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
The rules of good parenthood
1 Don’t be too possessive
Don’t control everything
2 Let the teenage crisis pass
Bugs and errors are good!
3 Help your software grow an adult
Give it free will
4 Use Lisp
5/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
We would not be afraid anymore. . .
6/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
We would not be ashamed anymore. . .
7/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
We could be proud. . .
8/8
Letting Go of
Control
Didier Verna
9/8