[rtpg]

agree that readability is super important.

I think there's a bit of a conflict with regards to immutability. When I see a variable in the code, it's much easier to handle a single definition rather than a "half-definition" followed by a bunch of conditionals.

I've also seen some waaay to concise code that becomes super legible after just one extra line of code to split things up.

I've run into the opposite problem a lot though. Even if every operation is simple, the length of code makes the intent unclear, especially in cases involving aggregation. Death by a thousand cuts

   results = []
   for elt in other_array:
      if elt is None:
         results.append(0)
      else:
         results.append(f(elt))

   
   results = [ f(elt) if elt is not None else 0
               for elt in some_other_array ]

In one example we have to read several lines to figure out some basic stuff, but in the other I can tell even at a quick glance that we have a mapping from one container to another, an expectation they're the same size, etc.

Clarity is the most important, and after a couple conditionals it makes sense to be more explicit about control flow. But many common tasks are not _about_ control flow, even if C-isms make us write them as if they do. "if" statements generate so many bugs, eliminating them is great.