Re: Issues with the logical consistency of The Third Manifesto

From: Marshall Spight <mspight_at_dnai.com>
Date: Tue, 16 Nov 2004 03:02:42 GMT
Message-ID: <l5emd.100856$R05.58376@attbi_s53>

"Christopher Browne" <cbbrowne_at_acm.org> wrote in message news:2vt20uF2qb9i2U2_at_uni-berlin.de...
> Martha Stewart called it a Good Thing when "Ja Lar" <ingen_at_mail.her> wrote:
> > "Alfredo Novoa" <anovoa_at_ncs.es> ...
> > <snip>
> >
> >> Tuples are objects, relations are objects, classes are objects,
> >> variables are objects, operators are objects, I am an object,
> >> everything is an object.
> >>
> >> A good definition of object is this:
> >>
> >> Object: Something intelligible or perceptible by the mind.
> >
> > With such a definition you exclude yourself from commenting on what
> > OO means. For you it obviously means everything, i.e. in fact
> > nothing in particular.

>

> Ah, but the problem is that those are all virtually equally legitimate
> answers as to what OO "means."

>

> I am only aware of two works that try to put together a theory-based
> presentation of what "objects" are:
> a) _A Theory of Objects_ by Martin Abadi, Luca Cardelli and
> b) _Types and Programming Languages_ by Benjamin C. Pierce

>

> Aside from those fairly obscure references, "OO" generally seems to
> mean "whatever programming model they put into my favorite language
> that they decided to call 'object oriented.'"

You call those obscure?! Is anyone who pays attention to theory and to OO unaware of these?

> Thus, to some, "OO" means the things you can express using C++
> classes.

>

> To others, it represents the things expressible using Java classes.
>
> To still others ...

Many people go on about how OO means so many different things, but I've not had that experience. It is true that there are different object models used by different OO programming languages, but the similarities are much greater than the differences. You have polymorphism, inheritance, and encapsulation. Go to comp.object and you'll hear lots of hair-splitting over details, but that doesn't mean there isn't substantial agreement.

Marshall Received on Mon Nov 15 2004 - 21:02:42 CST