Is there a future to Computer Science: The Lessons of Too Soon to Tell

by David Alan Grier (Associate Professor of International Science and Technology Policy)

Friday 10 Dec 2010, 14:00 → 15:30 Europe/Zurich

Kjell Johnsen Auditorium (30/7-018) (CERN)

Abstract:

Computer Science is an anomaly among technical professions.  It is of recent origins.  It has easily permeable boundaries.  It tends to spill into other fields as applications take dominate positions in certain parts of the discipline.  This presentation follows the reasoning of the book Too Soon To Tell by considering how Computer Science is transfering its values to other fields and losing its identity in the process.
 

Bio:

David Alan Grier is the Senior Vice President of the IEEE Computer Society for 2011 and writes the column "The Known World" for IEEE Computer.  He has worked in both industry and university.  He started his career as a systems programmer for Burroughs Corporation and is currently an associate professor of International Science and Technology Policy at the George Washington University.  He is a graduate of the University of Washington and is the author of Too Soon to Tell (Wiley 2009) and WHen Computers Were Human (2005).