Subject: Re: newbie in deep over his head
From: Erik Naggum <erik@naggum.net>
Date: Fri, 01 Mar 2002 13:12:05 GMT
Newsgroups: comp.lang.lisp
Message-ID: <3223977130308446@naggum.net>

* Erik Naggum
> I think using #'(lambda ...) is a notational grossity.

* Alain Picard
| Why do you say that?  Is that because you think (function (lambda ..))
| looks worse, or because that's what the (lambda ..) macro is there for?

  It is because I consider #' a notational grossity in general, but it is a
  _functional_ notational grossity.  (Is "grossity" even a word?  Hm, no,
  but it should have been, because of "curiosity".)  (Also pardon the pun.)

  I think (function car) is notationally better than #'car, but I think
  'car is notationally better than (quote car).  Why?  I have no idea.
  Some twisted sense of aesthetics or something, I guess, or maybe I am
  just used to ', maybe it is so small it is innocuous, whereas #' looks
  like Laurel and Hardy or something.  Therefore, (function (lambda ...))
  is better than #'(lambda ...), but since that is such a redundancy, I
  much prefer (lambda ...) by itself.

| I'm curious, because I never thought of #'(lambda ..) as ugly.  I just
| get used to seeing that #' everywhere I expect a function argument.

  But that would obviously make it problematic to use a function that
  returns a function.  I think of lambda as a function-constructor, whereas
  function is a function-getter.  (function (lambda ...)) would therefore
  get at the function that lambda constructs.  (Yes, I do know that it is
  function that makes the lambda form into a function.)  Another function
  or look-alike that returns a function would be similarly unquoted.

///
-- 
  In a fight against something, the fight has value, victory has none.
  In a fight for something, the fight is a loss, victory merely relief.