Re: merits of Lisp vs Python

On 2025-06-18, B. Pym <Nobody447095@here-nor-there.org> wrote:

Wade Humeniuk wrote:
>

John Thingstad wrote:
 

(defun + (array) (loop for number across array summing number))
for a array.
>

 
Really?
 
CL-USER 1 > (reduce '+ #(1 2 3))
6

>
Gauche Scheme
>
(use gauche.sequence)
>
(fold + 0 #(1 2 3))

Alas, that could have been

  (fold + #(1 2 3))

if they had only copied the good idea: when the initial accumulator is
not specified, infer it by calling the function without arguments.

With functions like +, you usually want the reduce accumulator to be the
identity element, and the function can give it to you: (+) -> 0.

For the list appending monad, the empty list is the identity element,
and that's what (append) returns, so it works for that too:

  (reduce #'append '((1) (2 3 4) (5))) -> (1 2 3 4 5)

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