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by nj5rq 670 days ago
> all popular programming languages can do basically anything

That's just very not true...
3 comments
mapcars 670 days ago
We need some example here, otherwise any language can generate code in the target language to do anything. And in the end all languages generate machine code one way or another so thats pretty much the same thing.
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nerdponx 670 days ago
Got an example?
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randomdata 670 days ago
SQL might be the most popular programming language. Perhaps you can think of something it cannot do, practically speaking[1]?

[1] Theoretically it might be able to do anything, but the context is clearly talking about what is, not what could be.

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jimbokun 670 days ago
It's true in terms of Turing Completeness.
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zarzavat 670 days ago
Turing complete just means you can simulate a Turing machine.

A Turing machine is a mathematical model of a computer, it’s not a real computer.

Real computers can do things that Turing machines can’t do, e.g. generating random numbers[0], interfacing with hardware, etc.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RDRAND

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