error correction (was circular graphs)

[Francois-Rene Rideau <address@hidden>]

On Thu, Jun 19, 2003 at 06:00:34PM -0400, Shriram Krishnamurthi wrote:
> Guy Steele - Sun Microsystems Labs wrote:
>>   (mapcar #'+ x '#1=(1 -1)) ;; [assume '#1=(1 -1 #1#)]
[And that was actually '#1=(1 -1 . #1#) !]

OK. So by what wonder of the thinking apparatus has Guy made this mistake?
By what wonder have so many of us looked at the code briefly and
understood what Guy *meant* despite his code being wrong?
Can such an implicit error-correcting behaviour be explicited?
Can it be automated? Has it been implemented?
What's the state of the art in DWIM technology?

Metalevellily yours,

[ François-René ÐVB Rideau | Reflection&Cybernethics | http://fare.tunes.org ]
[  TUNES project for a Free Reflective Computing System  | http://tunes.org  ]
The highest goal of computer science is to automate
that which can be automated. -- Derek L. VerLee