Algorithms (generally) are suffering some very bad press at the moment. Remember that algorithms are pretty cool and useful and great; it& #39;s just that some aren& #39;t put together all that well, and that& #39;s not the fault of the algorithms. They& #39;re just doing what they& #39;ve been told to.

Spoons are pretty cool and useful and great, but if someone designs a spoon with holes in it and spikes around the rim then it won& #39;t do a very good job of being a spoon. That& #39;s not an argument that spoons are terrible and to be avoided. It& #39;s evidence that that spoon-designer...

... shouldn& #39;t be allowed near the spoon-designing software again.

If a spoon-designer only ever socialises with people who drink tea and have no idea that some people might want to wolf gobfulls of Ben & Jerry& #39;s they will probably design a very small spoon for dainty purposes. That they haven& #39;t designed a spoon for ice cream troughers is...

... not the spoon& #39;s fault. It& #39;s a result of the designer not aiming their spoon at that particular audience. Don& #39;t ridicule algorithms; bring the people who designed the one that didn& #39;t do what it should to task.