Comments on: Y combinator http://www.arsmathematica.net/2005/05/17/y-combinator/ Dedicated to the mathematical arts. Fri, 29 May 2015 09:17:44 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.41 By: Robbie http://www.arsmathematica.net/2005/05/17/y-combinator/#comment-11 Wed, 18 May 2005 22:45:49 +0000 http://www.arsmathematica.net/?p=20#comment-11 Yes, the removal of side effects. Plus, the awareness that a recursive function call implies side effects (something you dont get from imperative languages).

]]> By: michael http://www.arsmathematica.net/2005/05/17/y-combinator/#comment-10 Wed, 18 May 2005 22:25:40 +0000 http://www.arsmathematica.net/?p=20#comment-10 What would your “why” be? I always viewed it as a removal of side effects. When the code becomes the data, then you get that interesting meta self referentiality, and you want to abstract the operation of transformations of the code, from the nuts and bolts of it. Perhaps I have not thought deeply enough about it. Thus I would be interested to hear your thoughts.

]]> By: Robbie http://www.arsmathematica.net/2005/05/17/y-combinator/#comment-9 Wed, 18 May 2005 14:40:04 +0000 http://www.arsmathematica.net/?p=20#comment-9 Coming from an imperative background, I read several explanations of Y-combinators before I understood why they were interesting (same for monads).

This explanation, found via a thread in classic Lambda the Ultimate, includes a good motivation for why.

]]>