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Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

[Posted October 25, 2011 by ris]

TechCrunch reports that John McCarthy has died. "McCarthy believed AI should be interactive, allowing for a give and take similar to AI simulators like Eliza and, more recently, Siri. His own labs were run in an open, free-wheeling fashion, encouraging exploration and argument. He won the Turing Award from the Association for Computing Machinery in 1972 and the National Medal of Science in 1991." (Thanks to Norman Gaywood)

(Log in to post comments)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 0:42 UTC (Tue) by tshow (subscriber, #6411) [Link]

I suppose it's inevitable that we'd start losing the first generation of programming language greats around the same time, but wow. What a loss to the world.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 2:29 UTC (Tue) by lutchann (subscriber, #8872) [Link]

In my undergrad years it amazed me that the field of computer science was so young that the inventors of it were still alive--many of them even still teaching. Sadly, that era is coming to an end.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 26, 2011 17:45 UTC (Wed) by abadidea (guest, #62082) [Link]

I graduated last year. My only regret in going to a small private university is that I was passing up the last chance students would ever have to take classes directly from the people who built up computer science from nothing - I figure there are only a few years left. I told myself "I will make up for it by meeting them at conferences and somesuch," but my opportunities are shrinking every time I turn around.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Nov 12, 2011 15:28 UTC (Sat) by gvy (guest, #11981) [Link]

Well, we'll still meet them. Rest in peace, John and Dennis.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 1:28 UTC (Tue) by mgb (guest, #3226) [Link]

Thank you so much. The world would have been a poorer place in so many ways without you.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 2:22 UTC (Tue) by aryonoco (subscriber, #55563) [Link]

Some month we are having :-|

Rest in peace John, and may you always be surrounded by parentheses.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 14:48 UTC (Tue) by jzbiciak (✭ supporter ✭, #5246) [Link]

Properly nested, balanced parentheses...

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 9:33 UTC (Tue) by dgm (subscriber, #49227) [Link]

Another giant leaves.

A terrible loss, not only because of his technical achievements, but specially by all the sparks it has helped light in so many minds.

Thank you so much for all this. Thank you for giving us a shoulder where we, smaller people, can stand to see further.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 25, 2011 16:18 UTC (Tue) by ccchips (guest, #3222) [Link]

A couple years ago, I read a book called " Notes from the MetaLevel " as I am a musician and wanted to learn more about computer music. This was my introduction to Lisp, which I had encountered in passing now and again when playing with various AI software. A very interesting language. (JOHN WE WILL MISS YOU)

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 27, 2011 0:29 UTC (Thu) by nix (subscriber, #2304) [Link]

That's an unusual way to be introduced to Lisp :) I was more conventional: like everyone else my age I was introduced to Lisp by the Emacs Lisp Introduction[1], then had to spend years unlearning the 1970s maclisp habits it had inculcated in me. But even that archaic Lisp was a revelation. Far more than, say, C, it changed the way I think about programming, for the better.

[1] what? all the cool kids were reading it!

()

Posted Oct 25, 2011 20:23 UTC (Tue) by DonDiego (subscriber, #24141) [Link]

You closed your last set of parentheses; rest in peace.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 26, 2011 1:07 UTC (Wed) by phgrenet (guest, #5979) [Link]

I am so sad today, I can't even begin to describe it.

My first job, 2 decades ago, was in a French Navy AI lab. I was probably the only one without a PhD in the office. We were the biggest data center for Lisp Machines in Europe.

I had a TI Explorer Lisp Machine on my desk, and I kept it for several years. This was certainly the most expensive personal workstation money could buy - huge memory for the time, fast and big disk, hi-res screen, processor instructions including CONS/CAR/CDR, etc. This machine was so wonderful. Imagine a machine where the shell uses the same language in which you write programs. Imagine a machine where you could change the programming language's own syntax and rules dynamically at run-time. Imagine a machine where all source code is available and editable (kind of like Smalltalk). Imagine a programming environment where a function can call a method on an object, which itself executes a set of Prolog rules. Imagine the best object-oriented programming language I have ever seen - CLOS (and I have seen many OO languages).

Today is a sad day.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 26, 2011 1:49 UTC (Wed) by shmerl (guest, #65921) [Link]

http://www.catonmat.net/download/the_eternal_flame-god_wr...

I was taught assembler in my second year of school.
It's kinda like construction work with a toothpick for a tool.
So when I made my senior year, I threw my code away,
And learned the way to program that I still prefer today.

Now, some folks on the Internet put their faith in C++.
They swear that it's so powerful, it's what God used for us.
And maybe it lets mortals dredge their objects from the C.
But I think that explains why only God can make a tree.

For God wrote in Lisp code
When he filled the leaves with green.
The fractal flowers and recursive roots:
The most lovely hack I've seen.
And when I ponder snowflakes, never finding two the same,
I know God likes a language with its own four-letter name.

Now, I've used a SUN under Unix, so I've seen what C can hold.
I've surfed for Perls, found what Fortran's for,
Got that Java stuff down cold.
Though the chance that I'd write COBOL code
is a SNOBOL's chance in Hell.
And I basically hate hieroglyphs, so I won't use APL.

Now, God must know all these languages, and a few I haven't named.
But the Lord made sure, when each sparrow falls,
that its flesh will be reclaimed.
And the Lord could not count grains of sand with a 32-bit word.
Who knows where we would go to if Lisp weren't what he preferred?

And God wrote in Lisp code
Every creature great and small.
Don't search the disk drive for man.c,
When the listing's on the wall.
And when I watch the lightning
Burn unbelievers to a crisp,
I know God had six days to work,
So he wrote it all in Lisp.

Yes, God had a deadline.
So he wrote it all in Lisp.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 26, 2011 17:04 UTC (Wed) by n5678 (guest, #80973) [Link]

RIP.

from an Emacs/Elisp user.

Creator Of Lisp, John McCarthy, Dead At 84 (TechCrunch)

Posted Oct 27, 2011 1:48 UTC (Thu) by pss (subscriber, #39291) [Link]

Thanks for the great insights and language, RIP from another elisp/emacs user. I never quite got into the language in terms of full blown programs, only minor emacs stuff years back ... enough to get a intuitive feel for the power of the language. From time to time I go back and read some of the language to keep reminding myself of the elegance and beauty.