I guess I was maybe unclear in how I worded things. I don't believe that Functional components with hooks are functional at all. What I believe is the React teams added hooks in response to pressure from a community that could not understand HOC to provide a functional-like paradigm, because all the "cool kids" were doing functional programming, and for whatever reason they care if people jump ship from React to truly functional tools. And the reason I didn't communicate that so directly is that's actually material best left to Part 2.

I disagree that hooks are easier to understand than "this" or HOCs. I'd argue that if you are too stupid to understand them, you will very quickly get sucked down a path that leads to ruin if you use hooks.

I'd refer you to these posts:

https://javascript.plainenglish.io/4-custom-react-hooks-every-developer-should-know-bf27af5b2dc

https://javascript.plainenglish.io/why-custom-react-hooks-could-destroy-your-app-performance-2fabbcbdff8e

I do _not_ believe the authors are stupid people. But they've gone off course, and are taking others with them.