It supports so many use cases primarily because of the small number of fundamental "constructs".
I mean, if I gave you protons, electrons and neutrons, you could build the universe out of them!
I mean, if I gave you protons, electrons and neutrons, you could build the universe out of them!
Expressiveness isn't inversely correlated to number of constructs.
In reality, it's not just about the small number of constructs, but also about how fundamental they are. In one sense, atoms are less fundamental than protons/neutrons/electrons, and therefore reduce the number of possible creations.
> In reality, it's not just about the small number of constructs, but also about how fundamental they are. In one sense, atoms are less fundamental than protons/neutrons/electrons, and therefore reduce the number of possible creations.
I think what OJFord is getting at is, what if you had more subatomic particles to build with?
Thus, whatever the complete set is for subatomic particles, it will most certainly have lesser members than for the complete set of atoms.
Getting back to my original point, SQL operates at a fundamental enough level that you do not need a great number of "constructs" to create a query that gives you whatever it is that you need.
I'm not saying it's perfect, but was just supplementing the OPs observation that SQL has surprisingly few "constructs".
Are we just assuming that protons and neutrons automatically pull in the quarks, neutrinos, other leptons and force carriers as well? Does the electron have a photon dependency? What about dark matter?
If not, then the our three particles are internally inconsistent and woefully incapable of building a universe. Otherwise, our set of dependencies is essentially the whole darn universe anyway.
Same goes for atoms. Give me enough and I can build a star or particle accelerator to create whatever elements or fundamental particles I want.
Also, the GPs suggestion of building an accelerator is as silly as someone writing an assembly compiler via a mush of SQL. It probably can be done, but it's not in the spirit of the topic!
Anyway, I feel like your original comment and my reply are kind of doing the same thing at the meta-conversation level. We're stretching a metaphor in order to make some counterpoint argument. My intent with the excessive pedantry was to highlight the farce of conflating rough metaphor with substantive insight.
Anyway, internet conversations are hard. Thanks for engaging!
Radiation makes the universe a lot more interesting.