#2115

Mentioned in 13 episodes

Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs (SICP)

Book • 1985

Gerald Jay Sussman

This book teaches central ideas of computation by establishing a series of mental models for computation.

It covers programming concepts common to all modern high-level programming languages and uses Scheme (or JavaScript in the latest adaptation) to formulate language processors.

The book focuses on discovering general patterns for solving specific problems and building software systems that make use of those patterns.

It was formerly used as the textbook for MIT's introductory course in computer science and is known as the 'Wizard Book' in hacker culture.

Mentioned by

Jonathan Frankle

Samuel Arbisman

Samuel Arbesman

Mentioned in 13 episodes

Quoted in "The Magic of Code", mentioned as a classic textbook.

EP 304 Samuel Arbesman on The Magic of Code

Mentioned by

Jonathan Frankle

when explaining the challenges of training large language models and the importance of understanding infrastructure.

State of the Art: Training >70B LLMs on 10,000 H100 clusters

Mentioned by

Anjana Vakil

, quoting a line about software being written primarily for human understanding.

#162 How to become a developer in your 30s with Anjana Vakil

Mentioned by

Eric Normand

while discussing the origins of the book and its focus on abstraction.

What is abstraction?

Mentioned by

Samuel Arbisman

as a seminal computer science text.

Magic Is Real—And It’s Living in Your Computer

Mentioned by

Samuel Arbesman

as a foundational computer science textbook.

Samuel Arbesman on his new book, The Magic of Code

Mentioned by

Eric Normand

as the source of examples used in their research paper.

Lisp: A language for stratified design

Mentioned by

Eric Normand

when explaining the concept of abstraction barriers in programming.

What is an abstraction barrier?

Mentioned by

Ben Deane

as a source for modeling pairs and lists using functions.

Episode 216: Programming Paradigms and Algorithmic Thinking

Mentioned by

Eric Normand

as an example of stratified design in a computer program.

Why does stratified design work?

Mentioned by

Kevin Ellis

as a classic book on Lisp that influenced his research.

[26] Kevin Ellis - Algorithms for Learning to Induce Programs

Mentioned as an example in the book, when talking about declarative feeling of a model.

What is the process for coming up with a good conceptual model?

Mentioned by

Jonathan Blow

when discussing his early computer class at Berkeley.

Jonathan Blow on his programming language jai and upcoming game(s)!

Mentioned by

Jeff Howard

in relation to the metaphor of programming as magic.

Patreon Tier 3 Free Content Dr. Jeff Howard 'Playful Occulture:' Magic & Gaming

Mentioned by Dimitri Kyriakoudis when discussing the importance of understanding computation, not just computers.

Raspberry Pi Hardware & A Lisp Brain (with Dimitris Kyriakoudis)

Mentioned by

Sam Aaron

while discussing the principles of programming language design.

Programming As An Expressive Instrument (with Sam Aaron)

Mentioned by

Eric Normand

as an example of an API with combining operations for images.

What is the closure property?

Mentioned by

Eric Normand

while explaining metacircular evaluators and their use in real-world programming.

Do we use metacircular evaluators in real life?

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