Hacker News Reader

Comment by josu | Hacker News Reader

I don't think it applies. Being bilingual means thinking in two different languages. I'm talking about your inner voice.

As far as I know, people don't think in Python or C. I would say that a programming language is like math. You can use it as a plugin in your language, but you still need the main program which is your language.

View on HN

I might not be so much about the language but about the paradigm. Certainly going from Java to C++ might not be that different but through in something like Haskell and you almost have to entirely rethink your solution.

One thing is setting your logic to follow a certain way of thinking, and a completely different thing is the language you are using to think.

Furthermore, programming languages are written in English. A real language cannot be written in another language.

I'm not a linguist nor a programmer, but I'm trilingual, and I have scripted at a basic level. And honestly, although I see the resemblance, I don't think that programming languages and real languages work the same way.

I'm trilingual (Spanish,French,German) and program fluently in at least 3 languages (Python, Javascript, PHP). Things in common: You build an idea in the air and shoot it in the language. Happens to me a lot in German where I don't have a vocabulary as wide as Spanish on English that the brain will have to build a sentence maybe 30% longer but it will eventually bring out something that does the job. When I'm coding I just know the program needs to do certain thing. Python is very straightforward while with PHP usually I need to build some auxiliary function (same as German , not that the word doesn't exist but I don't have it in my Head at the moment). Also, very obscure concepts like "Dativ" conjugation do exist in spanish but since it looks the same as "Genitiv" and "Akkusativ" , nobody pays to much attention. However when you are speaking German you'd better understand that as you need them to correctly build a sentence of the fly. An example analogy with coding would be generic data structures like arrays in PHP but in Python are more rich like Lists, Dictionaries and Tuples(IMHO)

You're not trilingual, as you also speak English :)

I agree. I notice that when I do imperative programming, I think through a sequence of steps, usually writing them down on paper if there is any complexity. When I "think in SQL" I read out the "from" and "where" clause in my head (or out loud). There is definitely a verbal element in my SQL thinking.

>As far as I know, people don't think in Python or C. I would say that a programming language is like math.

Are you saying people don't think in math? They definitely do

It might be difficult comparing even python and c but what about lisp and c or prolog?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com