Re: [Haskell-cafe] A Mascot

Maybe it's just me, but I've thought that being non-strict just means that it's possible for a function to produce some value even if it's argument doesn't; in other words, that it's possible to have "f (_|_) ≠ (_|_)". If there was no such thing as (_|_), what would non-strictness mean? On 16 Nov 2011, at 13:46, Bas van Dijk wrote:

On 16 November 2011 05:18, John Meacham wrote:

...

Not nearly enough attention is paid to the other striking feature, the laziness. The 'bottom' symbol _|_ should feature prominently. The two most defining features of haskell are that it is purely functional and _|_ inhabits every type. The combination of which is very powerful.

Is ⊥ the right symbol to express the non-strict evaluation of the language? Is it true that non-strict evaluation requires that ⊥ inhabits every type? In other words: why can't there exist a non-strict total language (probably having some form of coinductive types)?

Cheers,

Bas

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