> Felt like people'd been deliberately obtuse to keep me from learning.
Well, that's one way to put it. What's really going on is they are trying to describe an abstraction from a user's perspective. So you could say the point of abstraction is to be "deliberately obtuse" in a productive and healthy way.
It's also common for people to try and fail to abstract things. Bad abstraction can be a net negative. It's likely that was what happened here.
And, to agree with you, OOP as a taxonomy of physical objects is both a pervasive and a bad idea. The point of classes and objects is to group data and functionality together. The things you do with a "Rose" may or may not look like the things you do with a "Cactus". Forcing them into the same hierarchy of behaviors because they are both "Plants" is injecting extra requirements into the system.
Well, that's one way to put it. What's really going on is they are trying to describe an abstraction from a user's perspective. So you could say the point of abstraction is to be "deliberately obtuse" in a productive and healthy way.
It's also common for people to try and fail to abstract things. Bad abstraction can be a net negative. It's likely that was what happened here.
And, to agree with you, OOP as a taxonomy of physical objects is both a pervasive and a bad idea. The point of classes and objects is to group data and functionality together. The things you do with a "Rose" may or may not look like the things you do with a "Cactus". Forcing them into the same hierarchy of behaviors because they are both "Plants" is injecting extra requirements into the system.