Re: Languages don't matter. A mathematical refutation

["Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de>]

On Mon, 06 Apr 2015 14:12:08 -0700, Paul Rubin wrote:

> "Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de> writes:
>>> GC is not like matrix operations.  It's not a library that you call.  It
>>> pervades the operation of your entire program.
>> So is the floating-point unit on x86. You must save registers and restore
>> them when doing some unrelated operations. Does it make floating-point
>> multiplication high-level?
> 
> That's different, the FPU save/compute/restore is completely localized
> as long as you have a small amount of private memory to save the
> registers.  You can call a floating point routine that saves the
> registers, computes stuff, restores, and returns, and it doesn't have to
> care what the rest of the program does or vice versa.

Except that you must call this subprogram each and every place.

> GC is different, it affects every part of the program that uses memory,
> which is to say every part of the program.  Having precise GC requires
> enforcing invariants across all of memory, and the absence of language
> features (except maybe some special purpose unsafe fragment) that can
> break those invariants.  All the code generated by the compiler has to
> take the GC's requirements into account.  That's what I mean by
> pervasive.

Saving FPU registers, any registers, as a matter of fact, is as much
pervasive. How is it high level?

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de