"Does it use the same programming language you do?"

"Yeah, although it can convert things into standard ones long as they're Turing-complete and meet one or two other criteria. Nasty efficiency cost, but sometimes you gotta make sacrifices for compatibility."

"Or human readability in some cases."

"That would only apply if I were open-sourcing, which I approve of philosophically but have a hard time with practically being a Tinker and not a regular engineer."

"Yeah. At some point I kinda wanna see if I can even begin to wrap my head around it."

"Do you even know any programming?"

"Basic concepts? Some computability theory and stuff, math is fun, no actual languages."

"Well, you can have a look if you want but I don't think on that background you'll get anywhere."

"Would I get anywhere if I learned anything? Like, say, Java, or something."

"It'd give you a loose idea of what various operators are likely to be."

"I might do that for fun, then. Shouldn't be hard."

"Enjoy."

"I probably will! I don't suppose you have any pointers?"

"Not really, I never conventionally studied the stuff."

"Eh, there are probably good enough guides and tutorials online."

"Yeah, I think programming's one of the easiest things to pick up using only the internet."

"Probably. I think I might learn more if I actually have something to do with the language, though."

"Like what?"

"Dunno, it just sounds like the kind of thing that's easier to learn doing than, like, studying."

"Fair enough. I think some people make calculators? Or really simple chatbots."

"A calculator sounds like a good milestone. A chatbot sounds... more complicated."

"A simple chatbot. Like Eliza."

"I have no idea who Eliza is."

"Eliza's a chatbot that parrots your own poorly re-grammared statements back at you with therapist-speak appended."

"Therapist speak?"