What is a computer program? Historical & philosophical reflections
summary
Argues that “computer program” resists a single definition by tracing concrete historical cases: ENIAC rewired into a stored‑program machine and used wiring, flow diagrams and manuals; shows the stored‑program idea emerges from speed and practice not just 1930s theory; traces semantic shifts in “algorithm” and disputes the art vs science narrative; identifies three epistemological obstacles—words, opacity, dichotomies—and proposes an interdisciplinary, historically grounded method to make programs more transparent and to treat programs as non‑decided.
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chapters (7)
- 0:00Start
- 14:12First Computing Machines
- 20:19Rethink Computational Methods
- 28:41Education
- 29:01Computer Science Education for Schoolchildren
- 34:14Opacity and the Alienation
- 35:23Dichotomies
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