title: Please explain Python for loops to a C++/C#/Java programmer
body: <p>I have had experience in Java/C#/C++ and for loops or pretty much if not exactly done the same. Now I'm learning Python through Codecademy. I find it poor the way it trys to explain for loops to me. The code they give you is </p>
  
  <pre><code>my_list = [1,9,3,8,5,7]
  
  for number in my_list:
      # Your code here
      print 2 * number
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Is this saying <code>for every number in my_list ... print 2 * number</code>.
  That somewhat makes sense to me if that's true but I don't get <code>number</code> and how that works. It's not even a variable declared earlier. Are you declaring a variable withing the for loop? And how does Python know that number is accessing the values within <code>my_list</code> and multiplying them by 2? Also, how do for loops work with things other than lists because I've looked at other Python code that contains for loops and they make no sense. Could you please find some way to explain the way these are similar to something like C# for loops or just explain Python for loops in general.</p>