Does Python really follow its philosophy of "Readability counts"?

[Carl Banks]

On Jan 11, 5:41 pm, Paul Rubin <http://phr...@NOSPAM.invalid> wrote:
> Carl Banks <pavlovevide... at gmail.com> writes:
> > > The criticism is very valid.  Some languages do support immutable
> > > variables (e.g. "final" declarations in Java, "const" in C++, or
> > > universal immutability in pure functional languages) and they do so
> > > precisely for the purpose of taming the chaos of uncontrolled
> > > mutation.  It would be great if Python also supported immutability.
>
> > I don't think what you said (which is fine) makes his criticism valid,
> > unless you also suggest that all objects should be immutable.
>
> It would be enough to have a way to make specific objects and instance
> attributes immutable.

Enough for what, to make the guy's criticism valid?  No it wouldn't.
Or are you just ignoring the OP altogether and complaining about what
bothers you?

For my part I am concerned with answering the OP's issues here, not
yours.


> > If any objects are mutable, you have to be prepared for objects to
> > mutated outside the initializer.
>
> Sure, but why have mutable objects all over the place?  And, why
> always have attributes visible at all, outside the class definition?
> The approach in C++ and Java is to have public and private instance
> variables, where the private ones are visible only in the class methods.

The OP wasn't complaining about the fact that objects aren't
immutable, as far as I can tell, nor about having public and private
variables, so I can't agree Python's lack of these has anything to do
with the OP's concerns.


Carl Banks