The writer Wendy Wasserstein died this week, and though she probably didn't give a hoot about the inner workings of software and hardware, her death from lymphoma brings home how close the limits of technology lie. Because we can turn out blazing fast processors and then a year later come up with one that's even faster, we can reassemble the genetic code of extinct viruses, and we can shoot a rocket and hit a minute target hundreds of miles away, but we're still basically helpless when our biology turns on us.

If Wasserstein had been a software developer, her programs would have been noted for their the clarity of the code and the quirkiness of the function - just as her plays helped people of her (and my) generation both see themselves more clearly and take themselves less seriously. Well, yes, that's a stretch, but you get the point. -zander