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David Beazley - Lambda Calculus from the Ground Up - PyCon 2019

PyCon 2019
Tutorials
YouTube
4 HN users recommended this tutorial4 months2019–2021 score 5.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

HN calls it a brilliant, mind-bending introduction to lambda calculus for programmers.

David Beazley's PyCon 2019 tutorial derives the lambda calculus from the ground up in Python, using only single-argument functions. He builds booleans, numerals and more with no other language features.

“David Beazley gives a brilliant introduction to lambda calculus here” (HN, 2021)

3 strong recommendations · 1 recommendations · Tutorials · intermediate

4 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@ehsankia May 2019 Strongly recommends
on HN thread Python built-ins worth learning
Just watched his PyCon 2019 where he derives lambda calculus from scratch in Python, and he had similar shell magics going on there too. Great tutorial if you've never seen lambda calculus before, definitely brain twister. [this video]
Derives lambda calculus from scratch in Python
@sethgecko Aug 2019 Strongly recommends
on HN thread One-lined Python
If you want your mind to blow up I recommend watching this year's "Lambda Calculus from the Ground Up" PyCon talk by the wizard David Beazley [this video]
Mind-blowing lambda calculus PyCon talk
@globular-toast Jun 2021 Strongly recommends
on HN thread Lambda Calculus Examples (2009) [pdf]
For someone fluent in Python, David Beazley gives a brilliant introduction to lambda calculus here: [this video] This is great fun to follow through on a rainy afternoon!
Brilliant intro to lambda calculus for Python users

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

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