I suspect you have multiple definitions of nextEven
. That's the only explanation for your second example compiling. Repro:
module A =
let rec nextEven(x) =
let y = x + 1
if y % 2 = 0 then y
else nextEven y
open A //the function below will not compile without this
let nextEven(x) =
let y = x + 1
if y % 2 = 0 then y
else nextEven y //calling A.nextEven
Try resetting your FSI session.