Don't confuse the shortcomings of the tools you use with your intellectual limits. This is a very insidious philosophy and there is no good reason to internalize it. Always remember that tools must be subservient to user needs because they're tools.
I don't think Go's proposed system is parametric either. It's not clear to me how their contracts actually map to generics so I have no idea if Pike is telling the truth or just "thought leading".
> Although it's far from certain, after over a decade of work it looks like a design for parametric polymorphism, what is colloquially but misleadingly called generics...
What exactly is misleading about generics?
The psychology of thought leaders is fascinating. The term generics is colloquially understood to mean parametric polymorphism and here's Pike redefining the term to draw some distinction that doesn't really exist just to remain self-consistent.
Come to think of it, this is a really common pattern. If you've made remarks that you must now backtrack then refine terms until your old writing doesn't seem to contradict your current stance because you can just say people were using the terms wrong and you were right.