From: utzoo!decvax!harpo!floyd!vax135!ariel!houti!hogpc!houxz!ihnp4!ihuxr!lew
Newsgroups: net.lang
Title: postfix, infix, and recursive English
Article-I.D.: ihuxr.370
Posted: Wed Mar 23 13:02:54 1983
Received: Thu Mar 24 21:34:27 1983
Reply-To: lew@ihuxr.UUCP (Lew Mammel, Jr.)

A noun clause can be substituted for a noun. If the predicate nominative
of the noun clause is replaced by another noun clause, we have an example
of the recursive application of noun clauses.

The cheese stands alone.
The cheese the cat takes stands alone.  (standard English)
The cheese the cat the dog takes takes stands alone. (recursive, nonstandard)

These noun clauses are like polish postfix expressions, with the verb
as the operator. However, we can form the English analogue of infix while
retaining the recursive property.

The cheese which is taken by the cat which is taken by the dog stands alone.
(This does seem closer to standard English.)

This is like: cheese + cat + dog = alone

The iterative example (the dog takes the cat etc.) is more like:

dog += cat
cat += cheese
cheese = alone

The iterative version only uses "statement ::= variable op variable".
The recursive versions use "statement ::= expr op expr" and
"expr ::= expr op expr || variable". That is, they use the recursive
definition of an expression (or noun clause.)

		Lew Mammel, Jr. ihuxr!lew