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Even in impure languages, writing simple functions without side effects is the ideal of functional programming — the language just doesn't force it. If you want to write imperative code, just call it imperative. Don't call it functional just because that's the cool buzzword nowadays.

And whilst we're at it can people stop using "water" as a synonym for "pure water". Mud is water too, it's just not as pure!

anon_d has a point, im interested in the same take on using scala and other hybrids.

Terrible, terrible, terrible analogy.

The ecosystem of programming languages are analogous to class&race interplay in RPGs, especially RPGs where youve got strong distinctions between melee (imperative) and casting (functional) classes, with a smattering of hybrids (Python, Ruby, Scala, Clojure).

I think that's his point.

"After spending a long time in the functional programming world, and using Erlang as my go-to language for tricky problems, I've finally concluded that purely functional programming isn't worth it." (emphasis mine)

s/use/using/. I hate not being able to edit my comments.