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by sklogic 4200 days ago
Algebra and programming are very, very similar. Algebra [1] deals with formal languages and their rewrite rules in general. Programming is dealing with a certain (but yet very wide) class of formal languages and an extremely wide variety of rewrite rules (i.e., algebras).

It does not matter that nobody is using, say, a term "refactoring algebra", but it is still, essentially, an algebra.

[1] Here I'm referring to a generic meaning of "algebra", as in https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_algebra