8 ms·
Because it makes more sense?
by dboreham 2y ago
Because it makes more sense?
- Mond_ 2y agoDoes it actually make more sense, or is it just more familiar?
- kortex 2y agoI would wager within a rounding error, all humans have a lifetime of experience in following directions of the form: 1. do the first step in the process 2. then do the next thing 3. followed by a third action I struggle to think of any context outside of programming, retrosynthesis in chemistry, and some aspects of reverse-Polish notation calculators, where you conceive of the operations/arguments last-to-first. All of which are things typically encountered pretty late in one's educational journey.
- amelius 2y agoConsistency is more important. If you ever wrote: a(b()) then you're already breaking your left-to-right/first-to-last rule.
- ndriscoll 2y agoThere are some math books out there that use (x)f. My understanding is (some) algebraists tried to make it a thing ~60 years ago but it never really caught on.
- hollerith 2y agoThere are, but they leave out the parens and use context to distinguish function application from multiplication.
- regular_trash 2y agoThis is a foolish consistency, and a contrived counterexample. Consistency is not an ideal unto itself.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]