Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Sapir–Whorf and programming languages


 * The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review).  No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was   delete. \ Backslash Forwardslash / {talk} 05:33, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Sapir–Whorf and programming languages

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The article is pretty obviously original research, and wrong-headed research at that: The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis deals with the interpretation and intentionality of speech acts by entities (humans) who have a capacity for discretionary interpretation. This has nothing whatsoever to do with computer programming languages, since computers cannot be intentional, and their languages can't be subject to multiple interpretations or metaphors,and the ability of a programmer versed in one language to programme in another has nothing to do with Sapir Whorf at all. The article cites two references, one of which is a blog (ie non-notable) and the other makes no mention of Sapir whorf at all. ElectricRay (talk) 17:13, 24 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I think your first argument misses the point. "Programs must be written for people to read, and only incidentally for machines to execute" (source: SICP). You state that "the ability of a programmer versed in one language to programme in another has nothing to do with Sapir Whorf at all" - Programmers' way of thinking about problems is formed by their programming languages, and you will find it difficult to explain the concept of closures or monads to a pure C programmer (not to bash C programmers). --...- .-.  ... / -..  ..  ...  -.- 19:17, 28 June 2009 (UTC)

 Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Ron Ritzman (talk) 00:08, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Note: This debate has been included in the list of Computing-related deletion discussions.  -- TexasAndroid (talk) 00:21, 25 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion so consensus may be reached.


 * Delete This is an essay. It just does not have the references to justify an article. Not every idea someone has needs to be enshrined as an encyclopedia article. We should not be debating here whether it is true, but whether the idea has had significant coverage in multiple reliable and independent sources. There may be some truth in it: a programmer who started with flow charts and Fortran will approach an algorithm differently from one who started with object oriented programming and the prohibition of goto statements. Edison (talk) 16:54, 1 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Trim significantly and merge as section into Sapir–Whorf hypothesis A couple good external links, a couple decent ideas, but mostly WP:OR. --Cybercobra (talk) 23:21, 6 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Delete as original research. Eluchil404 (talk) 23:54, 7 July 2009 (UTC)
 * The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.