What does “fundamental concept” mean?

We hear the word “fundamental concept” thrown around a lot. But what is fundamental? I can’t think of anything more basic than language. Language is fundamental, right? Consider the words I have written, are any of them fundamental? Let’s go even more basic, are any of the letters used in those words fundamental? Take the letter “a” – is it fundamental? For someone who grew up learning a radically different alphabet (Chinese, Vietnamese, Japanese), would that person think that “a” is fundamental?

The letter “a” has a funny shape. Where did that shape come from? Long ago someone made up that shape and said, “From now on we will use this shape to represent the sound uh and the sound aye.” In other words, the letter “a” is a made-up thing. It’s not a natural thing. It didn’t come from nature. It’s not a law of nature. Can we really say something is “fundamental” if it was made up?

That said, clearly everything we think and create is based on – builds upon – those funny shapes that we call “the letters of the alphabet.” From the alphabet words were created and then words were put together to create sentences and then … and then the iPhone was created.

Is 1 + 1 = 2 fundamental? I don’t see it in nature. It and all of mathematics is purely a thing that humans created.

It seems to me the only things which can legitimately be called “fundamental” are the things of nature, such as trees and birds and clouds and sky and mountains and so forth. Everything else is just made-up stuff. So the next time someone says, “Here’s a fundamental concept” raise an eyebrow.

Why are there no comments in DNA?

In Computer Science one is taught early on that sprinkling comments liberally throughout code is a good thing. Comments enable the writer to remember what was done and readers to understand the code.

If comments are so useful to understanding, then why do biological systems have no comments? For instance, there are no comments in DNA. Wouldn’t comments make it easier to unravel the mysteries of DNA?

Suppose there were comments in DNA. What language would the comments be written in? It doesn’t seem reasonable that comments would be written in English (or French, German, etc.) since those are relatively recent languages whereas DNA has been around much longer. If DNA did have comments they would likely be written in a language that we don’t understand. Unraveling that language is likely to be as difficult as understanding DNA itself. In other words, comments probably wouldn’t help.

Consider this thought experiment: suppose one day we humans receive a message from an advanced civilization from another planet. People tell me that the message will likely be in a formal language such as mathematics. Will the advanced beings include comments in their message? Or will it be written purely in a formal language? As with DNA, it’s likely there will be no comments as any comments would most certainly not be a language that we humans use or understand.

So it seems that for a thing that must span the ages, such as DNA, and for a thing that must span civilizations, such as a message from an alien planet, the thing itself must be understood and comments are useless.

The formal structure/language must speak for itself.

A programming language that makes you smarter

A programming language is, well, a language.

It is a formal, structured language.

It has been my experience that if one immerses oneself in a language — any formal, structured language — it influences the mind.

Hypothesis: some languages influence the mind more positively, beneficially than others.

What programming language do you feel has the most positive, beneficial influence on one’s mind and thought process?

The one word understood by everyone, regardless of their language is …

Huh?