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Comment by the_mitsuhiko | Hacker News Reader

> They're both (subjectively) wrong: the natural place for data in JS is the this parameter.

... said the person not understanding the language semantics.

Passing arbitrary data as this is a terrible idea. It has to be an object and as such all primitives end up boxed.

Not in strict mode... `(function(){ console.log(typeof this); })(5);` try in sloppy and strict mode - remember modules are strict mode by default.

(function double() { return this * 2; }).call(2) === 4

I didn't have to box anything to pass a primitive as this. Maybe some other versions are different, but this works in Chrome 40 and Firefox 33.

Are you sure?

    > function isboxed() { return this instanceof Number; }
    > isboxed.call(5);
    true

as inglor said, this depends on strict mode:

    > var isboxed = (function() {"use strict"; return function isboxed() {return this instanceof Number;}}());
    > isboxed.call(5);
    false