 Methods on objects are functions attached to the object 's class ; the syntax <unk> ( argument ) is , for normal methods and functions , syntactic sugar for <unk> ( instance , argument ) . Python methods have an explicit self parameter to access instance data , in contrast to the implicit self ( or this ) in some other object @-@ oriented programming languages ( e.g. , C + + , Java , Objective @-@ C , or Ruby ) . 
