Binding was Re: Function declarations ?

[Patty]

"Gregory Ewing" <greg.ewing at canterbury.ac.nz> wrote in message news:95ntriFod7U1 at mid.individual.net...
> Tim Roberts wrote:
>> Andre Majorel <cheney at halliburton.com> wrote:
>> 
>>>Anyway, it seems the Python way to declare a function is
>>>
>>> def f ():
>>>   pass
>> 
>> No, that DEFINES a function.
> 
> Actually, it's more illuminating to say that it *creates* a function.
> 
> The 'def' statement in Python is an executable statement. Executing
> it has the effect of creating a function object and binding it to
> the indicated name. Before that has happened, attempting to execute
> any code referring to that name will fail.
> 
> Conversely, the function name doesn't need to be bound until the
> code referring to it is actually executed. So...
> 
>>     def g():
>>         return f()
>>     def f():
>>         return 3
>>     print g()
> 
> works because by the time g is *called*, both def statements
> have been executed, and both function names have therefore been
> bound.
> 
> -- 
> Greg
> -- 
> http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
> 
>

Hello folks - I understand all of the above (well I suppose intuitively based on the below) but had a longtime question and this is an opportunity to ask.  I have a B.A. in Linguistics and there was a topic they teach 'binding theory'.  This was taught in the graduate classes or some that I didn't take.  I will bet that these things are related - binding theory and this tossing around of words in software development like 'bound' and 'binding them'.  So I am wondering if you learned this in Computer Science or Computer Engineering?, on the job?  Is there a different theory in Computer Science than I would find in linguistics?

OK - so I just grabbed one of my semantics books and found one thing in the index 'bound occurence of a reference in a formula', doesn't really help.  It is in the Predicate Logic section and just used while he is trying to explain something else, used in context. 

Thanks

Patty
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