Origin of 'self'

[Rustom Mody]

On Tuesday, March 4, 2014 6:17:09 PM UTC+5:30, MRAB wrote:
> On 2014-03-04 02:09, Dennis Lee Bieber wrote:
> > On Sun, 2 Mar 2014 22:16:31 -0800 (PST), Westley Martínez declaimed:
> >> I understand that in an object method the first argument in the
> >> object itself, called self.  However, it doesn't have to be called
> >> self, and can be called anything.  So my question is why is it
> >> called self and not this like from C++ and Java.  It's kind of a
> >> silly question, but one that I'm curious about nevertheless.
> > It didn't want to be egotistical (as I recall, M$ VB uses "me")
> So does AppleScript.

> <OT>

> In AppleScript a script can refer to the title of a window as "title of
> window" or "window's title", and it can refer to the title of its own
> window as "title of window of me" or "me's window's title". Consistent,
> yes, but bad English.

> That's why I prefer a programming language not to be too much like a
> natural language. :-)

> </OT>

<Continue-OT>

There could be other conclusions.  Such as that English could learn
from AppleScript to not make bogus distinctions between me and my. Or
latin in which case is sufficiently explicit that word-order does not matter

<Even-more-OT>
Reminds me of
"How do we know whether smoking causes cancer or cancer causes smoking?"
</Even-more-OT>

</Continue-OT>