> Maybe if you view "programming" as one homogenous block of understanding
Oh, I'm not saying it's the same as programming in your favorite language.
I'm saying if you have the mental machinery to understand a new language, you also have it to learn lambda calculus. Trust me, it's not that hard. It just looks extraneous out of context because you are not familiar with it.
> It can probably be called accessible for people already interested or talented in maths
I'm not particularly good at maths and I found introductory-level lambda calculus not very difficult. The notation is different from, say, a C program. You just learn this notation, which your professor will explain. Nothing too terrible.
> layers of abstraction
I'm confused. Which layers of abstraction? I mean, it's an abstraction just like C or Python or "1 + 1" are abstractions. There are rules and you learn how to apply them.
Oh, I'm not saying it's the same as programming in your favorite language.
I'm saying if you have the mental machinery to understand a new language, you also have it to learn lambda calculus. Trust me, it's not that hard. It just looks extraneous out of context because you are not familiar with it.
> It can probably be called accessible for people already interested or talented in maths
I'm not particularly good at maths and I found introductory-level lambda calculus not very difficult. The notation is different from, say, a C program. You just learn this notation, which your professor will explain. Nothing too terrible.
> layers of abstraction
I'm confused. Which layers of abstraction? I mean, it's an abstraction just like C or Python or "1 + 1" are abstractions. There are rules and you learn how to apply them.