Exponentiation in Haskell

Question

Can someone tell me why the Haskell Prelude defines two separate functions for exponentiation (i.e. ^ and **)? I thought the type system was suppo

Answer 1

^ requires its second argument to be an Integral. If I'm not mistaken, the implementation can be more efficient if you know you are working with an integral exponent. Also, if you want something like 2 ^ (1.234), even though your base is an integral, 2, your result will obviously be fractional. You have more options so that you can have more tight control over what types are going in and out of your exponentiation function.

Haskell's type system does not have the same goal as other type systems, such as C's, Python's, or Lisp's. Duck typing is (nearly) the opposite of the Haskell mindset.