Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!clyde.concordia.ca!uunet!wuarchive!udel!carroll From: carroll@udel.edu (Mark Carroll ) Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc Subject: Re: The Universal Language Message-ID: <27882@nigel.ee.udel.edu> Date: 19 Aug 90 18:16:56 GMT References: <24281@megaron.cs.arizona.edu> Sender: usenet@ee.udel.edu Organization: University of Delaware Lines: 39 Nntp-Posting-Host: dewey.udel.edu In article <24281@megaron.cs.arizona.edu> gudeman@cs.arizona.edu (David Gudeman) writes: >In article <27388@nigel.ee.udel.edu> carroll@udel.edu (Mark Carroll ) writes: >>How can we realisticly unify the models of Pascal, Smalltalk, and ML? > >It's been pretty much done already, since Smalltalk subsumes both >Pascal and ML (modulo built-in functions that are present in ML but >not in Smalltalk). > I think that this is a completely ludicrous statement. Smalltalk does NOT subsume ML; ML is a strongly statically-typed language where most values are immutable. Smalltalk is a dynamically typed language which is completely dependant on local state. An ML program models lambda calculus expansion; "objects" are represented by immutable values which "stream" to handle time, creating a system where objects values never change, but identity does; Smalltalk programs model OO automata with object identity; an objects IDENTITY never changes, but its value does. They may have equivalent expressiveness, but neither one subsubes the other. > >>Or, suppose I write a log routine in a language like Prolog. How, within >>the structure of a single language, can I make imperative parts of the >>program handle backtracking? > >Icon is an imperative language with backtracking. It is a beautiful >example of how dissimilar paradigms can be combined. True. I deserved to be shot down on that one; if I had thought about it, I would have remembered Icon. >-- > David Gudeman -- |Mark Craig Carroll: |"We the people want it straight for a change; |Soon-to-be Grad Student at| cos we the people are getting tired of your games; |University of Delaware | If you insult us with cheap propaganda; |carroll@udel.edu | We'll elect a precedent to a state of mind" -Fish