Abstract
In his seminal paper on "Types, Abstraction and Parametric Polymorphism," John Reynolds called for homomorphisms to be generalized from functions to relations. He reasoned that such a generalization would allow type-based "abstraction" (representation independence, information hiding, naturality or parametricity) to be captured in a mathematical theory, while accounting for higher-order types. However, after 30 years of research, we do not yet know fully how to do such a generalization. In this article, we explain the problems in doing so, summarize the work carried out so far, and call for a renewed attempt at addressing the problem.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 149-180 |
Number of pages | 32 |
Journal | Electronic Notes in Theoretical Computer Science |
Volume | 303 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 28 Mar 2014 |
Event | Proceedings of the Workshop on Algebra, Coalgebra and Topology (WACT 2013) - Bath, United Kingdom Duration: 1 Mar 2013 → 1 Mar 2013 |
Keywords
- Category Theory
- Data abstraction
- Definability
- Fibrations
- Homomorphisms
- Information hiding
- Logical Relations
- Natural Transformations
- Parametric polymorphism
- Reflexive Graphs
- Relation lifting
- Relational Parametricity
- Universal algebra
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Theoretical Computer Science
- Computer Science(all)