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CS Scope

The document discusses the etymology and scope of computer science. It explores various terms that have been proposed for the field such as datalogy and informatics. The document also discusses how computer science relates to other fields like mathematics, engineering, and software engineering.

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8 views

CS Scope

The document discusses the etymology and scope of computer science. It explores various terms that have been proposed for the field such as datalogy and informatics. The document also discusses how computer science relates to other fields like mathematics, engineering, and software engineering.

Uploaded by

tirowe8061
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Etymology and scope

See also: Informatics § Etymology

Although first proposed in 1956,[36] the term "computer science" appears in a 1959 article in
Communications of the ACM,[37] in which Louis Fein argues for the creation of a Graduate School in
Computer Sciences analogous to the creation of Harvard Business School in 1921.[38] Louis justifies
the name by arguing that, like management science, the subject is applied and interdisciplinary in
nature, while having the characteristics typical of an academic discipline.[37] His efforts, and those of
others such as numerical analyst George Forsythe, were rewarded: universities went on to create
such departments, starting with Purdue in 1962.[39] Despite its name, a significant amount of
computer science does not involve the study of computers themselves. Because of this, several
alternative names have been proposed.[40] Certain departments of major universities prefer the
term computing science, to emphasize precisely that difference. Danish scientist Peter Naur
suggested the term datalogy,[41] to reflect the fact that the scientific discipline revolves around data
and data treatment, while not necessarily involving computers. The first scientific institution to use
the term was the Department of Datalogy at the University of Copenhagen, founded in 1969, with
Peter Naur being the first professor in datalogy. The term is used mainly in the Scandinavian
countries. An alternative term, also proposed by Naur, is data science; this is now used for a multi-
disciplinary field of data analysis, including statistics and databases.

In the early days of computing, a number of terms for the practitioners of the field of computing
were suggested in the Communications of the ACM—turingineer, turologist, flow-charts-man,
applied meta-mathematician, and applied epistemologist.[42] Three months later in the same
journal, comptologist was suggested, followed next year by hypologist.[43] The term computics has
also been suggested.[44] In Europe, terms derived from contracted translations of the expression
"automatic information" (e.g. "informazione automatica" in Italian) or "information and
mathematics" are often used, e.g. informatique (French), Informatik (German), informatica (Italian,
Dutch), informática (Spanish, Portuguese), informatika (Slavic languages and Hungarian) or pliroforiki
(πληροφορική, which means informatics) in Greek. Similar words have also been adopted in the UK
(as in the School of Informatics, University of Edinburgh).[45] "In the U.S., however, informatics is
linked with applied computing, or computing in the context of another domain."[46]

A folkloric quotation, often attributed to—but almost certainly not first formulated by—Edsger
Dijkstra, states that "computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about
telescopes."[note 3] The design and deployment of computers and computer systems is generally
considered the province of disciplines other than computer science. For example, the study of
computer hardware is usually considered part of computer engineering, while the study of
commercial computer systems and their deployment is often called information technology or
information systems. However, there has been exchange of ideas between the various computer-
related disciplines. Computer science research also often intersects other disciplines, such as
cognitive science, linguistics, mathematics, physics, biology, Earth science, statistics, philosophy, and
logic.
Computer science is considered by some to have a much closer relationship with mathematics than
many scientific disciplines, with some observers saying that computing is a mathematical science.[33]
Early computer science was strongly influenced by the work of mathematicians such as Kurt Gödel,
Alan Turing, John von Neumann, Rózsa Péter and Alonzo Church and there continues to be a useful
interchange of ideas between the two fields in areas such as mathematical logic, category theory,
domain theory, and algebra.[36]

The relationship between computer science and software engineering is a contentious issue, which is
further muddied by disputes over what the term "software engineering" means, and how computer
science is defined.[47] David Parnas, taking a cue from the relationship between other engineering
and science disciplines, has claimed that the principal focus of computer science is studying the
properties of computation in general, while the principal focus of software engineering is the design
of specific computations to achieve practical goals, making the two separate but complementary
disciplines.[48]

The academic, political, and funding aspects of computer science tend to depend on whether a
department is formed with a mathematical emphasis or with an engineering emphasis. Computer
science departments with a mathematics emphasis and with a numerical orientation consider
alignment with computational science. Both types of departments tend to make efforts to bridge the
field educationally if not across all research.

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