I love the fact that our precious λ symbol (for function abstraction) arose due to a series of typographical errors: www-users.mat.umk.pl/~adwid/materia
Conversation
Replying to
It seems like it might be reasonable to take this story with a grain of salt - it could be a tall tale, no matter how entertaining it seems. I'd be interested to know if anyone has any better sources on this!
Quote Tweet
Replying to @sigfpe @brendanzab and @sl2c
I remember hearing a talk by Dana Scott where he said that indeed this is a tall tale, and that Church chose the λ just because...he needed a letter. (Maybe somebody knows where to find this talk online?)
1
2
13
According to Dana Scott at least the goofy 'hat calculus' story I posted before is a myth: twitter.com/danghica/statu - tl;dw: somebody actually wrote to Alonzo Church asking why he used ‘λ’ and he replied back “Eeny, meeny, miny, moe…”
Quote Tweet
Replying to @noamzoam @sigfpe and 2 others
I was in the audience and filmed Dana Scott telling the story of what the lambda stands for.
youtu.be/juXwu0Nqc3I
2
14
29
A further twist in this tale is that Church _did_ actually come up with the 'Hat Calculus', but it was actually just a precursor to the lambda calculus: akivaleffert.com/papers/hat-cal
1
2
9
hat calculus
1
13
Show replies
I’d heard that it was because all letters earlier in Greek alphabet had been used. Alpha, beta, ...
1
2
You’re unable to view this Tweet because this account owner limits who can view their Tweets. Learn more
let over hat
1
3
Show replies
