[gituliar]

A key concepts beyond Mathematica are pattern matching and rule-based programming, but not a functional programming.

Yes, it has lambdas and first-class functions, but that's it. What about closures, for example? Therefore one would better not call Mathematica "a real functional programming language".

BTW, rule-based paradigm and pattern matching is a standard feature of languages from Lisp family, e.g. Scheme. From that point of view Mathematica is not something unique.

[programnature]

It is a feature of those systems, but not the foundation.

Mathematica is a term-rewriting system. This is a fundamentally different model of computation from the lambda calculus.

There are many practical consequences of this, in terms of the design of individual language constructs, and in how the language is used generally.

[gruseom]

There are many practical consequences of this, in terms of the design of individual language constructs, and in how the language is used generally.

That's interesting. Can you say what some of these consequences are?