Theoretical question about Lambda

[Alex Martelli]

pekka niiranen wrote:

> After reading about Scheme, I begun to wonder:
> 
> Is there any forced need for Lambda's in Python ? I mean does Lambda
> contribute anything that cannot be done otherwise in Python ?

Not really.  lambda lets you have an anonymous function, and create
a function within an expression (while def is a statement and does
require a name), so you may be able to collapse a few things a little
bit more, in theory, e.g.:

        funs = [lambda x: x+1, lambda x: x*2]

vs:

        def plus1(x): return x+1
        def times2(x): return x*2
        funs = [plus1, times2]

but that's about it.


Alex