> If you are finding that a whole class of types can be processed or related in exactly the same way, then these are probably the same type. This is like sayin

> If you are finding that a whole class of types can be processed or related in exactly the same way, then these are probably the same type. This is like saying "if a lot of different fruits can be processed the same way, then these are probably the same fruit" An example that makes it very clear is stringifying (e.g. for logging). You can stringify a user, you can stringify a database connection and you can stringify a boolean. But these three things are obviously not the same type at all. Therefore... > The motivation for using generics falls away when every domain type is fundamentally different in its shape and requires ad-hoc relations to be made on a contextual basis is wrong. However, bringing up the term "ad-hoc" is great! Because this is precisely what many languages are missing and where generics are absolutely needed. The languages that have the feature that you describe usually call it "type classes". Look up type classes in Haskell or Scala (if you are a JVM guy) or Rust where they call/implement it with traits (if you are a low-level guy).