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From whence Lisp envy?

Patrick W patrickw106 at yahoo.com.au
Mon Dec 16 22:50:12 EST 2002 
Aaron K. Johnson <akjmicro at yahoo.com> writes:

> ... ugly syntax

Most people seem to agree with you on that.  Dunno why, but from the
first time I encountered s-expressions (coming from a very different
background in C++ etc), I found them beautiful (conceptually if not
visually). 

>  and lame libraries--

Compared with Python's libraries, libraries in the free / open source
Lisp implementations are quite bare, that's true.  The commercial CL
implementations (AllegroCL, LispWorks) have much more complete
libraries -- but I don't use them myself.  If I want to drive the OS
or the network or a graphics library or an RDBMS with a high level
language I use Python.

> but be able to prove
> mathematical soundness....

You must be thinking of the FP crew.  The Lisp community parted
company with the purists several decades ago (though I guess it
lingers on in Scheme, to some extent).

> > Lisp is, in many ways, a more powerful language than Python, 
> 
> because of?...... don't tell me....macros, right? 

We're not supposed to mention macros ... because ... because
... (uhhh, why the fuck not, exactly?) ... you skipped the reasoning
altogether).

Take away the unique quality of anything, and then explain why it's
unique.  Describe the remarkable power of a quadriplegic weightlifter.
(You see some purpose in the task you're setting me?)

Even without macros, Lisp is arguably more powerful than Python -- but
who really cares?  Lisp *isn't* without macros.

> You can't see it, but I am holding Python pompoms every time I write in
> c.l.python! 

Oh I see that.  But something tells me that's not all you're
holding. ;-)

Cheers,
P.
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