Why can Haskell handle very large numbers easily?

Question

Hugs> 94535^445
1376320882321377050696053887661515621104890164005282153069726424773999801846841903244827702943487982707454966009456016735041878000604143500908532887464920380605164932112687039059526672109818924234920844448231612532570718657160234177285377733830104834041049076609912488237219608445995072867798430614935403219495883835042862802917980856774134757390782052200512932375660858045003581611863121089979673784484701791210379500218604466721285456487387736825167702127154268533859979529612671925052419513844416493584817268143587955662039327860394141299238613042312035808541735213479394437496215520277526351425482512084759462579494878772787079101513841720202004639843443083454387175700954018825292148776647553122504118229978165851660083576570848983047255050145168802863168613110619584686348869690774233051669081248424584219383477237544209892290799448207462345346336076966775224683516220960618177284844330167142846351091001423033864986042919757795382577032341453971393897073354841924116635150129850119992031076354249371062307034564093077675129303383786693131843907104175619570678630497198824622804914508555467550904967368926176118094672479099827962889569753303773699017596074205893197641101210911874606040804983166177455705972192827752532495287749766682029353154226049380290040508900715169403153139668217790502306177709467234413947747673881158973344492079455405942662489751581189327200960698310350121179918845099840977270519116578719881752429190273998774113278822810866144521416958558406602325070095207349450759264393913367193083149679216066539911941983836313340998945139132421885688290888674594474605510238217590823316979504437667252929278291853368754482552573193289277120902144178425726693671235675042499401282016643202758246845332593475338220708351934511933096882598943512036679145593929114103343255708217768511665236173107020739195152050863630870948954052925049746246549772984384435109578859863612603574306739909728739428192798727373799081111333186135697868385292787575475482883660605162944306327057220313320376280182432763977906971557137715710757099478269250731209785404487629107297262798803645379809868663503452656912571816192881412782623078761411808958183665272686617730596943579533808499348879195167683064937591552734375

Why can Haskell calculate such a large number, and other languages, such as Java, cannot (so easily)?

Answer 1

It's a difference in design philosophy:

• The designers of Haskell wanted to be sure that users would not be surprised by the seemingly arbitrary failure of an integer computation needing more than 32 bits.

• The designers of Java wanted to be sure that users would not be surprised by the seemingly arbitrary performance degradation caused by doing lots of computations over integers needing more than 32 bits.

In each language, you have to do something special to get the other kind of integer.

There's a long, honorable history of languages supporting arbitrarily large integers by default. Two of my favorites are Icon and Smalltalk, which are both over 25 years old.