lists and for loops

[Peter Pearson]

On Wed, 17 Aug 2011 20:08:23 -0700 (PDT), Emily Anne Moravec wrote:
> I want to add 5 to each element of a list by using a for loop.
>
> Why doesn't this work?
>
> numbers = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
> for n in numbers:
>      n = n + 5
> print numbers

Because integers are immutable.  You cannot turn 1 into 6.
Contrast this behavior with lists, which *are* mutable:

>>> numbers = [[1],[2],[3],[4],[5]]
>>> for n in numbers:
...   n[0]= n[0] + 5
... 
>>> numbers
[[6], [7], [8], [9], [10]]

For practical purposes, I'm sure you'll find other responders'
excellent posts to be of more immediate use, but keeping
mutability in mind helps.

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