Thank you, that’s helpful. The algorithm is a bit above my head to rewrite in Objective-C on Sunday, but from my superficial understanding of it the Objective-

Thank you, that’s helpful. The algorithm is a bit above my head to rewrite in Objective-C on Sunday, but from my superficial understanding of it the Objective-C version wouldn’t be really ugly. Yes, it would be wordier and clumsier, but tolerably so (for me). After all, it’s precisely these things where functional languages shine. I seldom find I have to monkey around with __block. Manual boxing/unboxing sucks, yes. It can be alleviated by a simple macro where this really matters, but I can see such and argument is like pouring petrol into the fire when compared to functional languages :) Now I understand what was meant by “sophisticated algorithms”. Yes, Objective-C is not perfect for those – first class collections are a great convenience here. But I certainly do not see that as a future “liability for Apple” or a huge drawback for the language ecosystem. It’s a niche.