Lambda Calculus

Lambda calculus is a formal system of mathematical logic for expressing computation with functions and recursion. An understanding of lambda calculus allows the data scientist to better recognize and leverage concepts of function abstraction for functional programming . Functional programming is a paradigm that is implemented in various programming languages in order to facilitate recursion, compact expressions, and immutable objects for more reliable distributed processing. Ideally, functional programming is characterized by concise functions that describe what is to be done, hiding the composition of more complex functions that depict how something is done. The latter scenario is more characteristic of standard procedural programming.