python 3 functools.reduce gives 0 if not literal list given -

i trying reduce in python , getting 0 when expecting other values:

in [1]: functools import reduce  in [2]: reduce( (lambda x, y: x * y), [1, 2, 3, 4] ) out[2]: 24  in [3]: def multiply(x, y): return x * y  in [4]: reduce( multiply, [1, 2, 3, 4] ) out[4]: 24  in [5]: reduce( multiply, range(5) ) out[5]: 0  in [6]: reduce( multiply, list(range(5)) ) out[6]: 0  [...]      in [11]: l = list(range(5))  in [12]: l out[12]: [0, 1, 2, 3, 4]  in [13]: reduce(multiply, l) out[13]: 0 

why getting 0 when not entering literal list? how can reduce arbitrary lists? missing?

python's range starts 0, not 1. 0 times causes 0 you're getting...