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Comment by sudhirj | Hacker News Reader

Sigh. Go without generics was useful. We built useful things with it.

Go with generics will continue to be useful, and it'll make it easier to build some things that were irritating to build earlier.

The design of generics went though so many rounds of iteration and discussions to make sure it wasn't a detriment to the language - indeed you can build everything that Go has already been used to build without ever knowing about or using generics.

Generics coming into a 1.x release also means that any code written under 1.x is expected to continue working perfectly, generics or not.

The process has made sure no damage will be done, and we now have a new toolkit to make solving some problems easier. I don't think anyone is trying to gaslight anyone by using generics.

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That's an expected pivot. From "nobody needs generics" to "we absolutely needed 10 years to figure out the best way to do parametric polymorphism, which was already known for 35 years when the language was created".

And of course in addition to that, there will probably be claims that "no one claimed that generics aren't needed". I'm glad that we have the archives to show that this isn't true, and it's a good thing to keep in mind when opinions are being pushed on HN.

Often the people that expressed that opinion are different people then for example the person you responded to here.

Please remember that this is a forum of a very big group of participants with varying points of view and resulting opinions.

Even if he was previously a person that said golang doesnt need generics, I struggle with your point of view. It seems you're of the opinion that nobody should be allowed to... change their opinion? Or at least has to be continuously told that they're dumb because they held an opinion that turned out to be incorrect? We're all people and make mistakes/have incorrect assumptions about topics, why not just accept that and move on?

You might want to refocus on what kind of person you want to be, because both of your comments come off as very hostile

You're arguing for charitable interpretations of statements by people who claimed Go didn't need generics or even that Go was better without them, saying that one should be able to change ones opinion without being called dumb. I fully agree.

Similarly, a charitable interpretation of what kubb wrote would be that they are referring to those who might have been dishonest in their defense of Go's lack of generics, which one might say kubb does indicate by using words like apologetes and zealots. The Internet is full of people who pick a team and will say dishonest things in perceived defense of it. I agree with kubb in this regard. That is the charitable interpretation of what kubb wrote, but instead you assumed kubb referred to everyone who ever voiced that opinion and suggested kubb should refocus on what kind of person they want to be.

The Internet needs more of charitable interpretations, and HN in particular. Perhaps I failed to interpret you charitably now? Nuances get lost easily in online debates... :)

I sort of agree. The most charitable interpretation is that kubb is “nutpicking”—addressing the least articulate and worst arguments of a community. But he would do us all a favor to acknowledge explicitly the boundaries of his criticism. For example, I hold the position that generics aren’t necessary, but that they will make some code more clear and a lot of other code less clear (and this has long been my position)—does kubb’s criticism apply to positions like mine? Am I his “zealot”?

Moreover, using terms like “zealot” to refer to people with whom one disagrees is very likely to inflame the thread (as indeed it already has, to a degree), whatever kubb’s intention.

The term "gaslighting" has become overwrought to the point where it's hard not to immediately dismiss anyone using it.

It is not a "pivot" for someone to say, "X isn't necessary", and then say, "X still isn't necessary but at least it's implementation doesn't break things".

There's no gaslighting. The Go team position was always something like "We didn't find a good way to include generics in the language, but if we do we may add them". That's a reasonable position.

However some people, which are referred here as "apologetes and zealots", claimed that you don't need generics and that they were a bad thing, which is a very different thing and not the opinion of the Go team.

The conclusion here is that these people were wrong, just like the ones that said that it was impossible to do anything serious without generics. While those people were busy arguing with other people on the net, the Go team and community were slowly but surely refining their ideas on generics and how to make them fit into Go.

I would say that Go without generics has been and is still useful for a whole lot of us.

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