The greatest PL talk of all time

Always a favorite.

Comments are closed on these previous submissions, so this is the best place to start a new discussion about this brilliant talk. You may want to read some of the previous discussions, so here are earlier submissions:

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=68918

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=92542

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=122989

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=150863

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=152311 <- 7 comments

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=626380

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=827107

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2359174 <- 21 comments

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3744125 <- 5 comments

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4245680

Also, here's the PDF of the talk:

http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~evans/cs655/readings/steele.pdf

http://www.brics.dk/~hosc/local/HOSC-12-3-pp221-236.pdf