Not Lisp again (2009)

If this presentation of Lisp and model of computation clicks with you, you owe it to yourself to read Structures and Interpretations of Computer Programs (SICP). The Abelson from the OP's lecture is the co-author, and the presentation described exactly follows the structure of the book (including the derivative example). It opened my eyes to a new way of thinking about coding when I first read it (and worked through the exercises) many years ago.

The real power of this isn't just differentiating a given function; as others have pointed out, you can do this in, e.g., C with function pointers. Having first-class procedures and closures means you can actually return the derivative as a function. This lets you do things that the simple example doesn't show. For a physics example, see https://mitpress.mit.edu/sites/default/files/titles/content/... : given a Hamiltonian (generalized energy) describing a mechanical system, you can automatically construct a…

The class mentioned in the article was actually made available under Creative Commons by the MIT OpenCourseWare[1], you can see the entirely of the course in Youtube. I watched and cannot recommend it enough, even for seasoned programmers [1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-J_xL4IGhJA&list=PLE18841CAB...