I recently implemented for fun Conway's Game of Life in Javascript (actually coffeescript but same thing). Since javascript can be used as a functional language I was trying to stay to that end of the spectrum. I was not happy with my results. I am a fairly good OO programmer and my solution smacked of same-old-same-old. So long question short: what is the (pseudocode) functional style of doing it?

Here is Pseudocode for my attempt:

class Node
  update: (board) ->
    get number_of_alive_neighbors from board
    get this_is_alive from board
    if this_is_alive and number_of_alive_neighbors < 2 then die
    if this_is_alive and number_of_alive_neighbors > 3 then die
    if not this_is_alive and number_of_alive_neighbors == 3 then alive

class NodeLocations
  at: (x, y) -> return node value at x,y
  of: (node) -> return x,y of node

class Board
  getNeighbors: (node) -> 
   use node_locations to check 8 neighbors 
   around node and return count

nodes = for 1..100 new Node
state = new NodeState(nodes)
locations = new NodeLocations(nodes)
board = new Board(locations, state)

executeRound:
  state = clone state
  accumulated_changes = for n in nodes n.update(board)
  apply accumulated_changes to state
  board = new Board(locations, state)