Just Work: The Gig Economy, Platform Capitalism and the Battle for Worker Rights
A comic by Tom Humberstone about gig workers and the need to organise, with loads of local Edinburgh flavour.
Wadler's Blog
Latest posts
GPCE Distinguished Reviewer
I am a Distinguished Reviewer of GPCE 2026 , colocated with ECOOP in Brussels. The award went to two out of a program committee of 33, putting me in the top 6%.
Don't Let Them Block Our Indyref Mandate
Brought to you by Believe in Scotland . You can sign the petition here . Tell your elected representatives and the Prime Minister that blocking our indyref mandate is unacceptable. The Scottish Parliament elections in May 2026 returned the largest ever pro-independence majority in the history of the Scottish Parliament. That democratic majority provides an undeniable mandate for a second Scottish…
Crank GPT
Not a crank project! Spotted via Robin Sloan .
Professor Emeritus
After retiring last July, the University Senate have approved my emeritus status. I'm grateful to Julian Bradfield for his work drafting the generous minute that accompanied the approval. Special Minute Professor Philip Wadler BSc, MSc, PhD, FRSE, FACM, FRS Emeritus Professor of Theoretical Computer Science We are pleased to nominate Professor Philip Wadler for the title of Emeritus Professor at…
A good life for the 99% isn’t a pipe dream: it can be done. Here’s how
Thomas Piketty is at it again. He and his colleagues at the World Inequality Lab have produced a report outlining, with quantitative modelling, what a just world might look like and how to get there. A summary appears in the Guardian , and their full report is online . I magine a future in which everyone enjoys high levels of wellbeing; where 90% of the world’s population doubles their income but…
Smaller, cheaper Plutus scripts with the UPLC command-line tool
If you want to see a use of Agda in real life, to provide certificates validating the correctness of compiler passes, check out this blog post from my colleague Ziyang Liu at Input Output. A simplified description of one of the passes appears in A Tale of Two Zippers, by myself, Jacco Krijnen, and Ramsay Taylor.
Wet Sidewalks and Odd Numbers
Phil Crissman explains Propositions as Types with a dialogue between Achilles and the Tortoise, in the style of Douglas Hofstadter (who in turn was inspired by Lewis Carrol). Lambda Man makes an appearance.
Maybe Don’t Talk to the New York Times About Zohran Mamdani
Peter Coviello explains how the New York Times enables right-wing billionaires to push their agenda. Like so many other bits of Times coverage, the whole of the piece is structured as an orchestrated encounter. Some people say this; however, others say this . It’s so offhand you can think you’re gazing through a pane of glass. Only when you stand a little closer, or when circumstances make you a…
Type Theory for All: The Goal of Science is to Communicate Ideas
Thank you to the crew at Type Theory for All for their thoughtful and well-prepared interview .
Curious: Brave New Bullshit
Haskell equations, thirty-eight years later
One night, while drifting off to sleep (or failing to), I solved a conundrum that has puzzled me since 1987. Before Haskell there was Orwell. In Orwell equations were checked to ensure order is unimportant (similar to Agda today). When an equation was to match only if no previous equation applied, it was to be preceded by ELSE . Thus, equality on lists would be defined as follows: (==) :: Eq a =>…
Translation Table
I remember seeing a version of the above in High School. My favourite entries, which I quote to this day, are "... accidentally strained during mounting" --> "... dropped on the floor" "... handled with extreme care throughout the experiments" --> "... not dropped on the floor" and "correct within an order of magnitude" --> "wrong" From Futility Closet . Spotted via Boing Boing .
Why are we funding this?
In the face of swinging funding cuts in the US, David Samuel Shiffman defends the value of scientific curiosity in American Scientist . Spotted via Boing Boing .
The Provocateurs: Brave New Bullshit
Update : My colleague Elizabeth Polgreen has kindly written a post for the ETAPS Blog describing my show. Philip Wadler is a man who wears many different hats. Both literally: fedoras, trilbys, even the occasional straw hat, and metaphysically: recently retired Professor of theoretical computer science at the University of Edinburgh; Fellow of the Royal Society; senior researcher at the blockchain…
The Provocateurs: Brave New Bullshit
[Reposting with update.] Following two sell-out shows at the Fringe last year, I'm on at the Fringe again: 11.25 Monday 4 August, Stand 2 w/Lucy Remnant and Susan Morrison 17.40 Sunday 17 August, Stand 4 w/Smita Kheria and Sarah-Jane Judge 17.40 Tuesday 19 August, Stand 4 w/Cameron Wyatt and Susan Morrison Shows are under the banner of The Provocateurs (formerly Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas).…
What is happening in Gaza is an injury to our collective conscience. We must be allowed to speak out
A powerful op-ed by Gabor Maté in the Toronto Star. Just as nothing justifies the atrocities of October 7, nothing about October 7 justifies Israeli atrocities against the Palestinians, either before or since October 7. Recently, I listened to orthopedic surgeon Dr. Deirdre Nunan, like me a graduate of UBC’s Faculty of Medicine, recount her harrowing experiences serving in a Gaza hospital under…
How to market Haskell to a mainstream programmer
An intriguing talk by Gabriella Gonzalez, delivered at Haskell Love 2020. Based largely on the famous marketing book, Crossing the Chasm. Gonzalez argues that marketing is not about hype, it is about setting priorities: what features and markets are you going to ignore? The key to adoption is to be able to solve a problem that people need solved today and where existing mainstream tools are…
The Provocateurs: Brave New Bullshit
Following two sell-out shows at the Fringe last year, I'm on at the Fringe again: 11.25 Monday 4 August, Stand 2 w/Lucy Remnant and Susan Morrison 17.40 Sunday 17 August, Stand 4 w/Smita Kheria and Sarah-Jane Judge 17.40 Tuesday 19 August, Stand 4 w/Cameron Wyatt and Susan Morrison Shows are under the banner of The Provocateurs (formerly Cabaret of Dangerous Ideas). Tickets go on sale Wednesday 7…
I've been nominated for a teaching award
I've been fortunate to be nominated for a few teaching awards over my career, and even to win a couple. The nomination I just received may be the best. As a new student at the uni, Philip Wadler was the first introductory lecture I had, and his clear passion for the subject made me feel excited to begin my journey in computer science. In particular he emphasised the importance of asking questions,…
Telnaes quits The Washington Post
Cartoonist Ann Telnaes has quit the Washington Post, after they refused to publish one of her cartoons, depicting Mark Zuckerberg (Meta), Sam Altman (Open AI), Patrick Soon-Shiong (LA Times), the Walt Disney Company (ABC News), and Jeff Bezos (Amazon & Washington Post). All that exists is her preliminary sketch, above. Why is this important? See her primer below. (Spotted via Boing Boing .)
Please submit to Lambda Days
I'm part of the programme committee for Lambda Days, and I’m personally inviting you to submit your talk! Lambda Days is all about celebrating the world of functional programming , and we’re eager to hear about your latest ideas, projects, and discoveries. Whether it’s functional languages, type theory, reactive programming , or something completely unexpected—we want to see it! Submission…
John Longley's Informatics Lecturer Song
From my colleague, John Longley , a treat. ‘Informatics Lecturer Song ’ (Based on Gilbert and Sullivan ’s ‘Major General song’) John Longley I am the very model of an Informatics lecturer, For educating students you will never find a betterer. I teach them asymptotics with a rigour that’s impeccable, I’ll show them how to make their proofs mechanically checkable. On parsing algorithms I can hold…
You can help Cards Against Humanity pay "blue leaning" nonvoters $100 to vote
How is this not illegal??? Cards Against Humanity is PAYING people who didn't vote in 2020 to apologize, make a voting plan, and post #DonaldTrumpIsAHumanToilet—up to $100 for blue-leaning people in swing states. I helped by getting a 2024 Election Pack: checkout.giveashit.lol . Spotted via BoingBoing . More info at The Register . (Only American citizens and residents can participate. If, like me,…
Remember to vote, tactically (a message for the progressive among you)
Happy Election Day! The above shows an average of five recent polls for my constituency, Edinburgh North and Leith, and comes courtesy of Stop the Tories . Clearly, the Tories have no chance, but I will still be voting tactically. I am a member of the Greens. But if everyone who intends to vote Green instead votes SNP, the SNP will beat Labour (rather than the other way around). While the SNP has…