9 ms·

>They are, ρ5 is not the same as 2ρ5. And +5 is not the same as 2+5. One is a sign and the other addition...

• gjulianm 4y ago
  Yes, so therefore + is context dependent. Some context dependency is unavoidable, but having everything be context dependent is bad design IMHO.
  • avmich 4y ago
    You're really making up and bending rules here. Did you learn an array language to see things both ways?
    • gjulianm 4y ago
      What rules? I am only saying that symbols add cognitive load, even more if they're context dependent. I don't think that's controversial at all, and APL and other array languages do have context-dependent symbols. And yes, I tried learning an array language but I didn't get far for two reasons: one, I didn't really see where could I apply it; two, it's really hard to discover things and learn incrementally when you can't really use autocomplete or even Google (punctuation and symbols are not well supported in search engines) to help with the large set of symbols/operations with multiple meanings each.
  • eggy 4y ago
    My point was that mathematical symbols are also context dependent and yet they work and are useful, so I don't get your argument of context dependency against APL's symbols.