Foundations of computing languages (was: How does Ruby compare to Python?? How good is DESIGN of Rubycompared to Python?)

[Cameron Laird]

In article <103qr5nhpiojv25 at corp.supernews.com>, I griped:
>In article <t5fq30l29nidjh1tsksm8jlld03ff3av5o at 4ax.com>,
>Stephen Horne  <steve at ninereeds.fsnet.co.uk> wrote:
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>>separated - hence a lot of the OO fuss. Currying is standard in
>>functional languages. But currying predates object orientation by a
>>long time. In fact, I'm pretty sure it was invented about a century
>>ago as math (lambda calculus) rather than as programming, though I
>>could easily be confused.
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>Ouch!  I'm old enough to take some of this personally.
>Unless you're making some extremely recondite point
>(about Skolem's influences?), "a century" is too rough
>an approximation for me.  Church and Kleene introduced
>the lambda calculus in the '30s; Schoenfinkel, then 
>Curry, invented currying the decade before.
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Wrong.  Well, true, all of it, but I'm neglecting Frege.
When I first posted my follow-up, I thought there was no
need even to mention him, because his work on anonymous
functions was too far on the other side of a century ago.
However, I poked around a bit, and the earliest analysis
of anonymous functions I know to this point is his 1891
*Function un Begriff*.  I agree that's "about a century
ago".  He *must* have written about them earlier, though
...
-- 

Cameron Laird <claird at phaseit.net>
Business:  http://www.Phaseit.net