Article View: comp.lang.functional
Article #808Re: why lambda ?
From: Kjell Post
Date: Sat, 23 Feb 1991 23:14
Date: Sat, 23 Feb 1991 23:14
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1388 bytes
In article <1952@seti.inria.fr> ddr@margaux.inria.fr (Daniel de Rauglaudre) writes:
>There is a question of great importance in our institute: why "lambda"
>in "lambda calculus" ? Why not "alpha" or "dzeta" or any other symbol ?
>Does anybody know the origin of this choice ? Thank you for you answers.
>
> Daniel de Rauglaudre
> INRIA - France
> ddr@inria.inria.fr
You could ask Church (I think he's still alive) but I don't think that
will help you because the last time they asked him he didn't remember
why he picked lambda.
There are some speculations on lambda being a degenerate form of the
caret-sign (``^'') but I recall Church saying that "it's possible but
I don't know...".
--Kjell
--
For athletes and programmers, ! Kjell E. Post
a woman is the end of their career. ! CIS/CE
! University of California, Santa Cruz
-- A.Wickberg ! Email: kjell@saturn.ucsc.edu
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Path: arc1-ca.pugleaf.net!utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!shelby!agate!darkstar!saturn.ucsc.edu!kjell From: kjell@saturn.ucsc.edu (Kjell Post) Newsgroups: comp.lang.functional Subject: Re: why lambda ? Message-ID: <12733@darkstar.ucsc.edu> Date: 23 Feb 91 23:14:52 GMT References: <1952@seti.inria.fr> Sender: usenet@darkstar.ucsc.edu Organization: University of California, Santa Cruz Lines: 24