Almost, a half-decade ago, in the 1965 ACM Programming Languages and Pragmatics Conference, we have Heinz Zemanek’s one article highlighting the issue of semiotics particularly in the pragmatic aspect as a relation between programming languages (PL) and their application fields.
Taking sign theory of the logic schools from two Charles: C.S. Peirce and C.W. Morris, Zemanek has adopted semiotic concepts and terminologies to programming languages, i.e. syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.
According to Morris’s pragmatic definition, which is different from Peirce, – the study of the relation of signs to interpreters, Zemanek argues: “There is always pragmatics because there is always an observer and because no language makes sense without interpretation.” The justification of pragmatics has been made by the existence of interpreters, interpretation and their relations to the PL.
Two types of pragmatics have been further identified as: “the mechanical pragmatics” and “the human pragmatics” since the principle of PL from Zemanek’s definition is the communication of programs between computers, from man to computers, from man to man, as well as from man to himself.
One issue concerning Zemanek’s prediction about “the central application of pragmatics around the computer” that deserves to be stressed is to make it possible for computer to “speak more and more and to restrict the human user in the practical situation to point at YES or NO, or some more equally simple choices, while the computer talks.” The interest in the study of how semiotics advance the computer and programming languages to reach this goal reveals a compelling vision to be crafted further on.
Outline:
Taking sign theory of the logic schools from two Charles: C.S. Peirce and C.W. Morris, Zemanek has adopted semiotic concepts and terminologies to programming languages, i.e. syntax, semantics, and pragmatics.
According to Morris’s pragmatic definition, which is different from Peirce, – the study of the relation of signs to interpreters, Zemanek argues: “There is always pragmatics because there is always an observer and because no language makes sense without interpretation.” The justification of pragmatics has been made by the existence of interpreters, interpretation and their relations to the PL.
Two types of pragmatics have been further identified as: “the mechanical pragmatics” and “the human pragmatics” since the principle of PL from Zemanek’s definition is the communication of programs between computers, from man to computers, from man to man, as well as from man to himself.
One issue concerning Zemanek’s prediction about “the central application of pragmatics around the computer” that deserves to be stressed is to make it possible for computer to “speak more and more and to restrict the human user in the practical situation to point at YES or NO, or some more equally simple choices, while the computer talks.” The interest in the study of how semiotics advance the computer and programming languages to reach this goal reveals a compelling vision to be crafted further on.
Outline:
