for / while else doesn't make sense

[Chris Angelico]

On Mon, May 23, 2016 at 10:36 AM, Jon Ribbens
<jon+usenet at unequivocal.co.uk> wrote:
> On 2016-05-22, Steven D'Aprano <steve at pearwood.info> wrote:
>> On Mon, 23 May 2016 01:52 am, Jon Ribbens wrote:
>>> On 2016-05-22, Steven D'Aprano <steve at pearwood.info> wrote:
>>>> How is this any better though? Complicated or not, people want to divide
>>>> 1 by 2 and get 0.5. That is the functional requirement. Furthermore, they
>>>> want to use the ordinary division symbol / rather than having to import
>>>> some library or call a function.
>>>
>>> That's a circular argument. You're defining the result as the
>>> requirement and then saying that proves the result is necessary.
>>> Clearly, people managed when 1/2 returned 0, and continue to do so
>>> today in Python 2 and other languages.
>>
>> I'm not defining the result. 4000+ years of mathematics defines the result.
>
> OK, I'm bored of you now. You clearly are not willing to imagine
> a world beyond your own preconceptions. I am not saying that my view
> is right, I'm just saying that yours is not automatically correct.
> If you won't even concede that much then this conversation is pointless.

The point of arithmetic in software is to do what mathematics defines.
Would you expect 1+2 to return 5? No. Why not? Where was the result
defined?

ChrisA