Linguistic Calculus

The Linguistic Calculus (LC) was created in 2013 and patterned after natural language and the lambda calculus, with the idea to make code that could be

• Written as prose
• Be read aloud in a consistent manner
• Interesting to write

Syntax

The syntax of LC is given by the following grammar. Please note that white space is only valid in places where white space is denoted in the grammar

program := sentence+
sentence := phrase '.'
phrase := assign | apply
assign := 'as' symbol ' ' body
apply := 'ap' ' ' body ' ' body
body := phrase | ref | lam
ref := 'rf' symbol
lam := 'lm' symbol ' ' body

The symbol production denotes a identifier consisting of letters

Phonetics

• Symbols are pronounced as themselves
• as- : "Assign-the-value-that-follows-to"
• ap- : "Use-the-following-value-as-parameter-in-the-function-that-follows-it"
• rf- : "In-the-current-scope-reference"
• lm : "The-function-with-the-following-body-and-parameter"

Turing-completeness

Unless I've overlooked something, this should be turing complete as it is simply a encoding of the lambda calculus