On Sun, Nov 27, 2022 at 12:32 PM Arthur O'Dwyer via Std-Proposals
<std-proposals_at_[hidden]> wrote:
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> On Sun, Nov 27, 2022 at 12:12 PM Mehmet Kayaalp via Std-Proposals <std-proposals_at_[hidden]> wrote:
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>> James, I believe you haven’t read my original posting—my apologies if I am mistaken and repeating myself unnecessarily: I believe C++ is on the right track by evolving itself over time. However, the ideal backward compatibility requirement as imposed hinders natural selection, which is at the core of evolution. As I said earlier: evolution involves not only the addition of new, worthy features to the gene pool but also the elimination of the old and nasty ones.
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>> Take a house metaphor. We continuously have been hoarding all new modern tools and storing them in this house, which has a limited capacity. The limitation here refers to our cognitive capacity. The bar you set for a “good” C++ programmer is raised every three years and, unfortunately, “the sky is the limit” does not apply to most mere mortals.
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> The same house metaphor is used by Sherlock Holmes himself, in A Study in Scarlet (1887). It might be interesting to consider whether Holmes' attitude here is "right" — what counter-arguments might one present against it? — and to what extent the same arguments and counter-arguments apply to C++.

The biggest counter-argument is that C++ is not *one person's* attic.
The equivalent is rather like Holmes deciding that an *astronomer*
shouldn't care about the relationship between the Earth and the Sun.

The C++ install base and existing code infrastructure is too big for
that sort of thing.