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I mean, yes, but this is like complaining that so much of functional programming as pushed by strangers on the internet is about building your own algebra over

by taeric 3y ago

I mean, yes, but this is like complaining that so much of functional programming as pushed by strangers on the internet is about building your own algebra over the data in your system. Both ideas can be great, but I push more for both of them to be used in modeling the system. If there are different sections with "agency" in your system model, OO can make a ton of sense to work with those parts. If you have data getting passed around and worked with a lot, FP makes a ton of sense.

coldtea 3y ago
>I mean, yes, but this is like complaining that so much of functional programming as pushed by strangers on the internet is about building your own algebra over the data in your system. I think it's not the same, because a taxonomy is a thing with limited descriptive power, and ultimately leading into a more or less arbitrary mapping, forced upon one's program design. Whereas "building your own algebra over the data in your system" has unlimited descriptive power, and is an abstraction over anything we do when we process data in a program. So, if we take "going to places" as a metaphor for programming, the first is like giving you the laws of motion and the ability to move in 4 dimensions as a tool (algebra), and the other is like telling you "you need to use a truck to travel, regardless of if you're going from LA to San Siego, from the bedroom to the WC, or from one floor to another" (OO).
- taeric 3y ago
  Apologies, you seem to think I'm throwing them both under a lot of the same bus. That was not my full intent, and I will gladly cede that academia pushed OO far harder and to worse results than many functional things were pushed. That said, I think you are giving "algebras of data types" a bit too much credit here. The vast majority of the coding that is done will not be made better by elaborate ways of coding things above and beyond a relational language. Having an algebra is a happy convenience when it works. But I have been bitten by far too many failed attempts at making them work to think it is "unlimited descriptive power."
  - coldtea 3y ago
    Yeah, talking more about algebra vs taxonomy in general, than about the data type algebraic facilities in various (functional or not) languages (which could be quite limited for non-algebraic reasons). I mean any transformations we do on the data still consistute an algebra, even if it's not encoded/enforced in the type system.

by taeric 3y ago

coldtea 3y ago

>I mean, yes, but this is like complaining that so much of functional programming as pushed by strangers on the internet is about building your own algebra over the data in your system. I think it's not the same, because a taxonomy is a thing with limited descriptive power, and ultimately leading into a more or less arbitrary mapping, forced upon one's program design. Whereas "building your own algebra over the data in your system" has unlimited descriptive power, and is an abstraction over anything we do when we process data in a program. So, if we take "going to places" as a metaphor for programming, the first is like giving you the laws of motion and the ability to move in 4 dimensions as a tool (algebra), and the other is like telling you "you need to use a truck to travel, regardless of if you're going from LA to San Siego, from the bedroom to the WC, or from one floor to another" (OO).

taeric 3y ago
Apologies, you seem to think I'm throwing them both under a lot of the same bus. That was not my full intent, and I will gladly cede that academia pushed OO far harder and to worse results than many functional things were pushed. That said, I think you are giving "algebras of data types" a bit too much credit here. The vast majority of the coding that is done will not be made better by elaborate ways of coding things above and beyond a relational language. Having an algebra is a happy convenience when it works. But I have been bitten by far too many failed attempts at making them work to think it is "unlimited descriptive power."
- coldtea 3y ago
  Yeah, talking more about algebra vs taxonomy in general, than about the data type algebraic facilities in various (functional or not) languages (which could be quite limited for non-algebraic reasons). I mean any transformations we do on the data still consistute an algebra, even if it's not encoded/enforced in the type system.