Newbie: finding the key/index of the min/max element

[John J. Lee]

On Thu, 2 May 2002, Alex Martelli wrote:
[...]
> Given that performance considerations cannot necessarily be _kept_
> apart, the main worth of FP is still as a thinking tool (in most cases).
[...]

I'm surprised enough by this statement that I think I must have
misunderstood it.  Surely the fact that performance can't always be
separated from the rest of programming doesn't imply that 'higher-level',
slower languages than C++ (such as Python) are only of value as thinking
tools in most cases??


John