Further examples exhibiting scope inheritance:

class Test{
    public $func;
    public function callFunc(){
        $this->func();
    }
}

$foo = 'hello';

$test = new Test;
$test->func = function() use implicit{
    echo $foo;
}

$test->callFunc(); // hello

I really prefer to be explicit about what you bring into a restricted scope. That 
has been PHP's approach from day 1 with the explicit nature of the 'global' 
keyword to declare explicitly which global variables a function will muck with.

And in PHP 5.4 with the implicit binding of $this I think most of the motivation 
for a request like this is gone anyway.

Thank you for your response Rasmus.

I can understand the motivation to restrict "scope inheritance", especially with 
the introduction of closure rebinding (which I must say, I am excited to use in 
production)

Hopefully closure rebinding will afford me the functionality that was sought 
after 
with this request. All the same, thank you for your consideration.

:)