[randallsquared]

I don't disagree with any of that. I just think that combining concepts doesn't necessarily reduce the number of ways things can go wrong (even if, as you say, it increases the number of things that can go right as well).

For an extreme case of what I mean, consider Church numerals.

[fit2rule]

Well, tables can and do often "go wrong", but alas the success-case is rarely accounted.

I would warrant that there must be something to them, or else we wouldn't be discussing them as persistent features of a social phenomenon, which is something I think we all take for granted about software language: it is entirely social.

Whereas your extreme case is mathematically derived, our social habits occur because of decisions.