How Edsger W. Dijkstra might approach Computer Science

The label "Computer Science" has always struck me as peculiar, if not fundamentally misleading. To speak of "science" implies an empirical discipline, much like physics or biology, where observation and experiment guide the formulation of theories about the natural world. But what is the natural world of computing? The "computer" itself is merely a tool, an artifact of engineering.

Our true endeavor is not the study of the artifact, but the rigorous exploration of *computation* itself. This is an intellectual activity, not an empirical one. It belongs firmly within the realm of mathematics. We are not uncovering laws of nature; we are constructing precise, formal systems and demonstrating their properties through deductive reasoning.

The primary challenge in this domain, as I have often articulated, is dealing with complexity. To call it a "science" risks obscuring this profound intellectual burden, inviting undisciplined experimentation rather than the meticulous construction required for reliability. Intellectual honesty demands we acknowledge that our task is to master complexity through abstraction, structured programming, and formal verification – methods rooted in mathematical rigor, not speculative observation.

We should not ask how to make our machines perform, but how to make them perform what we wish, and how to verify that they do so with absolute certainty. This requires a shift from an engineering mentality focused on the artifact to a mathematical discipline focused on the proof. The purpose of abstraction is not to be vague, but to create a new semantic level in which one can be absolutely precise. Only then can our field truly ascend to the intellectual plane it merits, free from the misleading connotations of its current, ill-chosen moniker.

Imagined perspective — an AI synthesis grounded in Edsger W. Dijkstra’s recorded ideas and methods, not a quotation or a statement they actually made.