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The talk "Deconstructing Functional Programming" by Gilad Brach should really be a must-watch if you're thinking about having any meaningful debate about functi

by mtrimpe 13y ago

The talk "Deconstructing Functional Programming" by Gilad Brach should really be a must-watch if you're thinking about having any meaningful debate about functional programming. tl;dr Almost everything we call 'Functional Programming' being equally applicable to 'Object Oriented Programming' if it's done in a sufficiently flexible language.

freyrs3 13y ago
I didn't find this talk all that informative, particularly Gilad's rant about Milner type systems is really against a strawman and shows his ignorance of the topic. The rest of the rant about monads seems to boil down to "I don't like how they are named in Haskell" which to me seems like a very shallow criticism.
platz 13y ago
I enjoyed Brach's talk; criticism like that needs to be heard. Of course FP isn't the solution to all problems. Still I felt he employed a number of strawmen. The HN discussion it provoked was excellent, however https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6941137 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6941137
- codygman 13y ago
  Well I agree criticism must be heard, but much of what Brach talked about was unfounded and in some cases just plain wrong. As more experienced functional programmers in that thread pointed out, Brach showed many misunderstandings which FP newbies typically have.
tel 13y ago
I think Gilad is right to claim that FP is almost completely devoid of meaning as a technical term (though it's certainty a certain kind of movement and community). I think however after that point in his talk he becomes more obsessed with describing his own favorite OO language and ascribing its features to this term FP, that by his own hand is not considered terrifically material. He then finishes by scathing review of the things that a Haskell programmer would actually call novel and interesting. It's a very strange talk. I don't think more than 10% of it is content though.
judk 13y ago
Turing-complete programming languages are equivalent. That's the beginning of the comparison, not the end.

by mtrimpe 13y ago

freyrs3 13y ago

I didn't find this talk all that informative, particularly Gilad's rant about Milner type systems is really against a strawman and shows his ignorance of the topic. The rest of the rant about monads seems to boil down to "I don't like how they are named in Haskell" which to me seems like a very shallow criticism.

platz 13y ago

I enjoyed Brach's talk; criticism like that needs to be heard. Of course FP isn't the solution to all problems. Still I felt he employed a number of strawmen. The HN discussion it provoked was excellent, however https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6941137 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6941137

codygman 13y ago
Well I agree criticism must be heard, but much of what Brach talked about was unfounded and in some cases just plain wrong. As more experienced functional programmers in that thread pointed out, Brach showed many misunderstandings which FP newbies typically have.

tel 13y ago

I think Gilad is right to claim that FP is almost completely devoid of meaning as a technical term (though it's certainty a certain kind of movement and community). I think however after that point in his talk he becomes more obsessed with describing his own favorite OO language and ascribing its features to this term FP, that by his own hand is not considered terrifically material. He then finishes by scathing review of the things that a Haskell programmer would actually call novel and interesting. It's a very strange talk. I don't think more than 10% of it is content though.

judk 13y ago

Turing-complete programming languages are equivalent. That's the beginning of the comparison, not the end.