What can Haskell's type system do that Java's can't and vice versa?

Posted by Matt Fenwick on Programmers See other posts from Programmers or by Matt Fenwick
Published on 2012-10-08T15:50:36Z Indexed on 2012/10/08 21:50 UTC
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I was talking to a friend about the differences between the type systems of Haskell and Java. He asked me what Haskell's could do that Java's couldn't, and I realized that I didn't know.

After thinking for a while, I came up with a very short list of minor differences. Not being heavy into type theory, I'm left wondering whether they're formally equivalent.

To try and keep this from becoming a subjective question, I'm asking: what are the major, non-syntactical differences between their type systems? I realize some things are easier/harder in one than in the other, and I'm not interested in talking about those.

And to make it more specific, let's ignore Haskell type extensions since there's so many out there that do all kinds of crazy/cool stuff.

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