[r6rs-discuss] [Formal] Max and min with zero arguments

[John Cowan]

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Submitter: John Cowan
Email address: cowan at ccil.org
Issue type: Enhancement
Priority: Minor
Component: Arithmetic
Report version: 5.91
Summary:  Max and min should be allowed to have zero arguments.

In R5RS the max and min functions must take at least one argument,
because there is no universal maximum or minimum.  In R6RS, however, we
have +0.inf and -0.inf.  I suggest, therefore, that (max) => -0.inf and
(min) => +0.inf.  This also allows multiple-argument max and min to be
defined using a fold primitive ver two-argument versions.

Alex Shinn's remarks on #scheme inspired this comment, but he is not
to be held responsible for it.

-- 
John Cowan  http://ccil.org/~cowan    cowan at ccil.org
There are books that are at once excellent and boring.  Those that at
once leap to the mind are Thoreau's Walden, Emerson's Essays, George
Eliot's Adam Bede, and Landor's Dialogues.  --Somerset Maugham