[Tutor] beginning to code

[Steve D'Aprano]

On Mon, 18 Sep 2017 10:42 pm, Rick Johnson wrote:

> Steve D'Aprano wrote:
> 
>> [snip: offensive statements]
>>
>> Your insistence on adding the entirely superfluous, unnecessary
> 
> Please acquaint yourself with the definition of superfluous,
> as in most i have seen, the actual word "unnecessary" is
> part of the definition.

That whooshing noise you are hearing is the point flying over your head.

Did you really not observe, notice or see that I have been intentionally,
deliberately, purposely and by design using redundant, superfluous, unnecessary
phrases and expressions to drive home the point that redundantly comparing a
bool to True was redundant and unnecessary? I thought it was blatantly obvious.

The difference is that in English, we can sometimes use redundancy for emphasis,
as in "blatantly obvious" or "critically important". There are also some common
phrases which are technically redundant but long use has turned them into
idioms, stock phrases and sometimes even cliches:

- prior experience (all experience is technically prior);

- plan ahead, or plan for the future (you can't plan for the past);

- moment in time (you can't have a moment in space);

- mental attitude (attitude is always mental).


But most of the time redundancy is just poor use of language:

- enter into: to enter is to go into, so you are going into into;

- current status quo: the status quo is the current state of affairs, 
  so it is the current current state;

- joint cooperation: if it isn't done jointly, it isn't cooperation;

- manually by hand: manually literally means "by hand".

And so it is with `if True == True`. It is poor use of language.



-- 
Steve
“Cheer up,” they said, “things could be worse.” So I cheered up, and sure
enough, things got worse.