> [Java 8 and C++11 lambdas] are essentially syntax sugar for an ad-hoc function that's what a lambda is pretty much anywhere, FP or not :) > [in FP] you're s

> [Java 8 and C++11 lambdas] are essentially syntax sugar for an ad-hoc function that's what a lambda is pretty much anywhere, FP or not :) > [in FP] you're supposed to be doing absolutely everything with lambdas even addition in imperative programming, are you supposed to be doing everything by writing symbols to a moving tape, a la Turing? there's more to FP than pure lambda calculus, even if it was the starting point. sure, natural numbers and other types can be implemented with lambdas. no serious FP language actually does that.