> Personally the distinction between subroutines and functions always struck me as overly math-centric thinking
Not really, many programming languages generally considered math-centric are perfectly fine with functions returning (or taking) a unit type of some sort, category theory (and even its predecessor abstract algebra) has a lot of use for initial and terminal objects, etc.
It’s more like mathematicians used to be vaguely uncomfortable with non-referentially transparent things when computation as a mathematical object was new. They realized the error of their ways pretty quickly, all in all, but a realization such as this can take decades to make its way through layers of educational materials.
> I don't quite get why [ = for equality] remains contentious
Because it’s a huge problem when teaching, even if it isn’t for competent practitioners. Maybe it wouldn’t be if we put CS (and graphs, and games, and lots of other things utterly lacking in prerequisites) in elementary-school mathematics where it belongs, but if wishes were horses I’d have a racing franchise by now.
Yes, "math-centric" in the sense of high-school math (=> "functions are R->R").
I mentioned the = thing because I only ever see this brought up by what seems like a very particular developer tribe. I used to tutor 1st semester CS students in programming C and Java - for many this was the first time they were programming - and I don't think I've ever seen someone confused about it. Lots of other things though; programming is hard.
Not really, many programming languages generally considered math-centric are perfectly fine with functions returning (or taking) a unit type of some sort, category theory (and even its predecessor abstract algebra) has a lot of use for initial and terminal objects, etc.
It’s more like mathematicians used to be vaguely uncomfortable with non-referentially transparent things when computation as a mathematical object was new. They realized the error of their ways pretty quickly, all in all, but a realization such as this can take decades to make its way through layers of educational materials.
> I don't quite get why [ = for equality] remains contentious
Because it’s a huge problem when teaching, even if it isn’t for competent practitioners. Maybe it wouldn’t be if we put CS (and graphs, and games, and lots of other things utterly lacking in prerequisites) in elementary-school mathematics where it belongs, but if wishes were horses I’d have a racing franchise by now.