On Monday, August 11, 2014 12:33:59 AM UTC+5:30, Chris Angelico wrote: > On Mon, Aug 11, 2014 at 4:26 AM, Rustom Mody wrote: > > Its when we have variables that are assigned in multiple places that > > we start seeing mathematical abominations like > > x = x+1
> That's an abomination to you because it breaks your mathematical > model. It's fine to a computer, which has a sense of time. It does?!?! Completely missed the news flash Last I knew they were as dumb as a rock -- maybe a GHz rock A C programmer asked to swap variables x and y, typically writes something like t = x; x = y; y = t; Fine, since C cant do better. But then he assumes that that much sequentialization is inherent to the problem... Until he sees the python: x,y = y,x The same applies generally to all programmers brought up on imperative style. Yeah there are problems that need to address time -- OSes, network protocols, reactive systems like window managers etc But the vast majority of problems that a programmer is likely to solve dont need time. These are of the form: Given this situation, this is the desired outcome. Nothing wrong with giving a sequential solution to a not inherently sequential problem. What is wrong is then thinking that all *problems* are sequential rather than seeing that some over-specific sequential *solutions* to non-sequential problems are ok. A mindset exemplified by your hilarious statement: "computers have a sense of time" -- https://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
