[plt-scheme] Re: What about "The Little Schemer"?

Jose A. Ortega Ruiz wrote:
> Woodhouse Gregory
> <gregory.woodhouse at gmail.com> writes:
>
>   
>> This, together with its companion volume "The Seasoned Schemer", are
>> books I've returned to many times. By no means should you expect to
>> fully appreciate them on a first read! Unlike HtDP programs, this
>> isn't really a general introduction to programming in Scheme. It's not
>> a cookbook or an an "advanced" text in the usual sense, either. It's a
>> book about ideas. I think these are books that will make you a better
>> programmer, not by teaching "coding techniques" but by helping you to
>> understand some fundamental concepts in a deeper way.
>>
>>     
>
> Total agreement. I remember that it was reading these books that
> concepts like (tail) recursion, the Y combinator or continuations really
> 'clicked' on me. The same goes for 'The Reasoned Schemer' and
> declarative programming. And yes, the clicking only really happened on
> second or third readings, which only adds to the fun (i still laugh when
> i remember my stupid feelings after my first reading of TLS).
>
>   
Excellent books, but y combinator has always seemed, for want of a 
better word, pointless to me. Yep i am Neanderthal.