I work as a teaching assistant in a compsci 101 lab - I found this paper to be incredibly eye opening, and will hopefully help me link the intuitive thoughts people have with the specific language features they should be using. We just did a lab on lists and for loops, and this paper basically clarified what the issue most people were actually having, that they wanted to operate on the list in aggregate. While this paper does seem to be looking at potential changes for new languages, it's useful for more than that.
And what makes you think that these potential new language features won't make it easier for experienced programmers as well? Sure, everyone will eventually get their head around iterative loops, but should we not be using the most efficient language for our brains? At the end of the day, a non intuitive concept will have inherent overhead.
I taught javascript to an older person once, and I think for-loops are one of those things that people who studied programming think "are not so bad", but it's absolutely senseless and insane to outsiders.
I'm thinking
var output = [];
for (var i=0; i<listOfThings.length; i++) {
var thing = listOfThings[i];
var newThing = applyAction(thing);
output.push(newThing);
}
And what makes you think that these potential new language features won't make it easier for experienced programmers as well? Sure, everyone will eventually get their head around iterative loops, but should we not be using the most efficient language for our brains? At the end of the day, a non intuitive concept will have inherent overhead.