In a functional language, you don't have to worry about bits of code mutating your data. ;-) On the flip side, there's a lot of cognitive load that comes with functional languages, so while they do address the problem neatly...
I'd have to take a look at Virgil to appreciate your approach, but I'm always leery of implicit value vs. reference semantics tied to types (aside from the whole array fiasco, easily the ugliest part of Java's type system). So often the particular semantics you want are driven by the context of what you're doing, rather than the what you're doing it with.
I'd have to take a look at Virgil to appreciate your approach, but I'm always leery of implicit value vs. reference semantics tied to types (aside from the whole array fiasco, easily the ugliest part of Java's type system). So often the particular semantics you want are driven by the context of what you're doing, rather than the what you're doing it with.