It is always hard to make oneself understood in emotion-laden situations, but I did try. I prefaced my comment about the logical adequacy of TS with the words
Long-winded and ugly . . . Perhaps an analogy will help. Boolean algebra is usually discussed using the binary operations disjunction (inclusive-or) and conjunction and the singulary operation negation. It is, however, possible to shown that one binary operation, either NOR or NAND suffices. This is intellectually interesting. It is not an argument for doing boolean algebra using only one imperspicuous operation. One instead introduces trivial definitions of disjunction and conjunction in terms of either NOR or NAND and then proceeds in the usual way. Analogously, both flavors of Compare and Swap and, now, PLO are very useful; and the fact that they are logically dispensable is NOT an argument for dispensing with them. Multiplication is dispensable too. It can be replaced by successive additions. This is not, however, an argument for eliminating multiply instructions. Small boys are likely to cut themselves when they start hacking about with Ockham's razor. John Gilmore, Ashland, MA 01721 - USA ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@listserv.ua.edu with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
