[plt-scheme] Re: Why "lambda"?

On May 29, 2009, at 9:35 AM, Prabhakar Ragde wrote:

> I suggest to you, wooks, that it is not the use of Greek symbols,  
> but the quality of the exposition that matters to you. You are  
> willing to forgive Cohen his Greek (and a bit of Russian) because he  
> uses it judiciously.
>
> HtDP sensibly rewrote `car' and `cdr' to `first' and `rest', but did  
> not rewrite `lambda'. I make this a teaching point. `lambda' has  
> considerable historical resonance, and a common meaning to many  
> people, just as a capital sigma or Leibnitz's long S does. --PR

"Considerable historical resonance" and "common meaning to many  
people" apples to Greek letters, but not "car" and "cdr" ?   :)

rac


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