[Haskell-cafe] The maximum/minimum asymmetry

[Mario Blažević]

     I was recently surprised to discover that the maximum and maximumBy 
functions always return the *last* maximum, while minimum and minimumBy 
return the *first* minimum in the list. The following GHCi session 
demonstrates this:

$ ghci
GHCi, version 7.2.1: http://www.haskell.org/ghc/  :? for help
Loading package ghc-prim ... linking ... done.
Loading package integer-gmp ... linking ... done.
Loading package base ... linking ... done.
Loading package ffi-1.0 ... linking ... done.
Prelude> :module +Data.List Data.Ord
Prelude Data.List Data.Ord> let list = [(1, 'B'), (1, 'A')]
Prelude Data.List Data.Ord> maximumBy (comparing fst) list
(1,'A')
Prelude Data.List Data.Ord> minimumBy (comparing fst) list
(1,'B')

     I would normally consider this kind of gratuitous asymmetry a bug, 
but seeing that these functions' implementations have been specified in 
the Haskell 98 Library Report, I guess they are now a permanent feature 
of the language. Can anybody explain the reason for this behaviour?