Re: One last chapter to review! Last chance! One-day only!

From: Duane Rettig (duane_at_franz.com)
Date: 03/11/05 

Date: 10 Mar 2005 16:02:30 -0800

Kent M Pitman <pitman@nhplace.com> writes:

> David Steuber <david@david-steuber.com> writes:
>
> > rydis (Martin Rydstr|m) @CD.Chalmers.SE writes:
> >
> > > > What strikes as perverse is to write code that depends upon the
> > > > order of argument evaluation.
> > >
> > > Not when that order is specified (in the language or the
> > > implementation). Why would it be?
> >
> > I was sort of wondering the same thing. Isn't something like:
> >
> > (if (foo) (bar) (baz))
> >
> > rather dependent on the order of evaluation?
>
> I think the flaw happens when people learn one language by assuming its
> definition is a dependent on the other. They are constantly afraid that
> the [imagined] "truth" will suddenly out.
>
> When I worked as Project Editor on ISO ISLISP, some in the German
> group would veritably panic if I wrote "... will ..." and INSISTED
> that I should change "will" to "shall". "What's the difference?" I
> would ask. "They mean the same thing." Some time later, I was making
> an abortive attempt to learn German, and I found out that in German,
> "will" does not have the sense of certainty that it does in English.
> I suddenly understood the source of their apprehension. (I guess they
> assumed that since English probably got this word from German, we must
> have taken the meaning with it, though we didn't.

Actually, we did; if you look at Old and Middle English texts, and
writings even as late as King James and Shakespeare, you find that
the word "will" (and even still today with its past tense "would")
really means "desire", more so than it provides a plan of action
or a requirement. Perhaps the difference has gotten lost in the
American "can-do" culture, where there is only a small step from a
desire to do something to a plan or an order to do that thing.
Note that we still tend to use shall exclusively in legal documents,
and it's always a "Last Will and Testament", which word only means
sense as translated as "desire" - a dead person can no longer plan
a future action...

> They had likely
> been fearing a phantom capability of change in English that wasn't
> really there. If you think of English as some kind of bastardized
> German, then you'd easily worry that the truth about the Real Meaning
> would somehow eventually come out.

It's more likely that the Real Meaning was in its etymology, and we
Americanms (at least) tend not to see that etymology because the
usage is so deeply ingrained.

> If you think of English as a first
> class language in its own right, it's harder to make this mistake.)

As one who thinks of English as a first class language, but not in
its own right (i.e. it has had help from German and all Latin
languages), I will [sic] continue to make that mistake.

How does this relate to argument order? I don't know, but I do agree
with your general take that the perception one has about both issues
is closely tied to the experiences one has had with each, and not
with its wording. 

-- 
Duane Rettig    duane@franz.com    Franz Inc.  http://www.franz.com/
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