[Edu-sig] re: Types and true division (was Re: strange output

[Tim Peters]

[Kirby Urner, to Arthur]
> ...
> You side-step my question, as to whether what you're after is
> acknowledgement that a reasonable person reading the PEP at
> some point in the past, might have concluded, as you apparently
> did, that the behavior of the div operator was being changed
> by Guido solely in order to mollify specific concerns, Sherwood's
> & Pausch's in particular.

A reasonable person could have concluded that Guido was *primarily*
motivated by that at the time.

Those folks were the first to bring up the issue forcefully, and Guido
recognized the correctness of their conclusion at once.  Figuring out *why*
the conclusion was correct stretched out over years, and Guido didn't move
to change the language until after his brain caught up with his designer's
intuition.  That's often how the creative process works, and the original
inspiration is irrelevant at the end.  Heck, for all I know, the Mona Lisa
didn't have a truly good reason for smiling, either.  According to

    http://library.thinkquest.org/13681/data/link2.htm

Da Vinci actually painted a self-portait in drag.  Does it matter?  The
smile is exactly right regardless.