Neal Stephenson Quote

Computers speak machine language, Hiro says. It's written in ones and zeroes-- binary code. At the lowest level, all computers are programmed with stringsof ones and zeroes. When you program in machine language, you are controllingthe computer at its brainstem, the root of its existence. It's the tongue ofEden. But it's very difficult to work in machine language because you go crazyafter a while, working at such a minute level. So a whole Babel of computerlanguages has been created for programmers: FORTRAN, BASIC, COBOL, LISP, Pascal,C, PROLOG, FORTH. You talk to the computer in one of these languages, and apiece of software called a compiler converts it into machine language. But younever can tell exactly what the compiler is doing. It doesn't always come outthe way you want. Like a dusty pane or warped mirror. A really advanced hackercomes to understand the true inner workings of the machine -- he sees throughthe language he's working in and glimpses the secret functioning of the binarycode -- becomes a Ba'al Shem of sorts.Lagos believed that the legends about the tongue of Eden were exaggeratedversions of true events, the Librarian says. These legends reflectednostalgia for a time when people spoke Sumerian, a tongue that was superior toanything that came afterward.Is Sumerian really that good?Not as far as modern-day linguists can tell, the Librarian says. As Imentioned, it is largely impossible for us to grasp. Lagos suspected that wordsworked differently in those days. If one's native tongue influences thephysical structure of the developing brain, then it is fair to say that theSumerians -- who spoke a language radically different from anything in existencetoday -- had fundamentally different brains from yours. Lagos believed that forthis reason, Sumerian was a language ideally suited to the creation andpropagation of viruses. That a virus, once released into Sumer, would spreadrapidly and virulently, until it had infected everyone.Maybe Enki knew that also, Hiro says. Maybe the nam-shub of Enki wasn't sucha bad thing. Maybe Babel was the best thing that ever happened to us.