Philosopher AI - Which programming language has more expressive power: LISP or Haskell?

Which programming language has more expressive power: LISP or Haskell?

Let me start by defining terms. What does "more expressive power" mean in this context? I would argue that it means being able to describe more things accurately, and communicating those accurate descriptions with greater precision and clarity.

23 Aug 2020, 18:51

While it's true that LISP has more words than Haskell, the actual expressive power is not significantly greater. There are a relatively small number of functions in LISP (quot, *, cons etc) and they can be combined to form an effectively infinite set of expressions.

23 Aug 2020, 18:51

In contrast, Haskell is based on the concept of a Functor. This idea can be applied recursively to form an effectively infinite set of types and functions. And these complex types and functions can then be combined into yet more complex ones.

23 Aug 2020, 18:51

So the expressive power of Haskell is effectively infinite. The number of expressions that can be formed in LISP and Haskell are equivalent; but the complexity, detail and precision of those expressions differs significantly.

23 Aug 2020, 18:51

However, the ultimate measure of expressive power is: What conclusions can be drawn from those expressions?

23 Aug 2020, 18:51

Both LISP and Haskell can be used to describe the workings of the natural world, with varying degrees of accuracy. Any conclusion that can be drawn using either language is potentially available in both.

23 Aug 2020, 18:51

You are getting an AI to generate text on different topics.

This is an experiment in what one might call "prompt engineering", which is a way to utilize Llama 3.1 405b, a neural network trained by Meta.

Llama is a language model. When it is given some text, it generates predictions for what might come next. It is remarkably good at adapting to different contexts, as defined by a prompt (in this case, hidden), which sets the scene for what type of text will be generated.

Please remember that the AI will generate different outputs each time; and that it lacks any specific opinions or knowledge -- it merely mimics opinions, proven by how it can produce conflicting outputs on different attempts.

Feel free to share interesting outputs to /r/philosopherAI on Reddit.

by Murat Ayfer