What is Expressiveness in a Computer Language

[Matthias Blume]

David Squire <David.Squire at no.spam.from.here.au> writes:

> Andreas Rossberg wrote:
>> Rob Thorpe wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> No, that isn't what I said.  What I said was:
>>>>> "A language is latently typed if a value has a property - called it's
>>>>> type - attached to it, and given it's type it can only represent values
>>>>> defined by a certain class."
>>>>
>>>> "it [= a value] [...] can [...] represent values"?
>>>
>>> ???
>> I just quoted, in condensed form, what you said above: namely, that
>> a value represents values - which I find a strange and circular
>> definition.
>> 
>
> But you left out the most significant part: "given it's type it can
> only represent values *defined by a certain class*" (my emphasis). In
> C-ish notation:
>
>      unsigned int x;
>
> means that x can only represent elements that are integers elements of
> the set (class) of values [0, MAX_INT]. Negative numbers and
> non-integer numbers are excluded, as are all sorts of other things.

This x is not a value.  It is a name of a memory location.

> You over-condensed.

Andreas condensed correctly.