Invisible wrote:
> What do rewrite rules have to do with abstract algebra?

Algebra *is* rewrite rules.

> Well fair enough. But certain people seem to think that "if you haven't 
> even bothered to do an undergraduate course in advanced mathematics, you 
> shouldn't be allowed near a computer". Which just seems absurd to me...

Agreed.

> ...which *I* do, but your typical programmer has *no clue*.

I think learning what an identity value is should be pretty easy. :)

> We need propper documentation here! The docs for existantial 
> quantification are similarly vague. (But hey, it's a compiler manual, 
> not a language tutorial... *sigh*)

So write them.

> Yeah, what *are* Haskell's goals? An often-quoted one is "avoid success 
> at all costs". They seem to be doing a good job!

Haskell doesn't have goals. He's dead. The programming language doesn't have 
goals. It was never alive.

> Imagine trying to explain what a number "is" to somebody who doesn't 
> already know. Well, I mean sure, the integers are easy enough. But what 
> about negative numbers? Fractions? Irrationals? Transcendentals? 
> Imaginary numbers? Hmm... actually, this is pretty hard!

I don't know. That was like third and fourth grade, here.

-- 
   Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Why is there a chainsaw in DOOM?
   There aren't any trees on Mars.

Post a reply to this message