Keith Wright <xxxxxx@free-comp-shop.com> writes:

> So the real question is: What do you gain by having isomorphic
> types with all the operations repeated with different names,
> and how many times are you willing to do everything over
> from the beginning when somebody thinks of a "new" kind
> of list which is not a list, but is rather a stack, a queue,
> a bill of materials, a star catalog, ...

The point that we've been trying to make is that they're not
isomorphic.  I'd also be curious how many applications you have where
you want to re-use an abstraction that recurses into lists for syntax,
except for a generic pattern matcher which we already have.

> In the past the rumor had been floating about that syntax could
> _not_ be represented as the lists it appears to be, because
> hygienic macro expansion required a lot of information at the
> internal nodes.  But now, until somebody finds the bug, it
> seems that Dr. van Tonder has shown that is not true.

You're misstating the rumor.

Andre has shown that the issue can be worked around.  This has both
benefits of convenience and quite substantial cost.  We're having an
argument over whether the cost is worth the convenience.  I can see
why someone would argue that the convenience is worth it.  I don't
agree.

--
Cheers =8-} Mike
Friede, Völkerverständigung und überhaupt blabla