merits of Lisp vs Python

[mystilleef]

Bill Atkins wrote:
> Are any of these not subjective?

Objectivity is in the eye of the beholder.

> Lisp is much more than a functional language.

Maybe so. But I've only ever appreciated its functional aspects. I
wouldn't choose Lisp or its derivatives for OO related tasks even if
I'm high.

> Uh huh.  Can you cite examples of this?  Sounds like you're just
> making stuff up here.  Contrary to popular belief, writing a Lisp
> macro that warps your mind and introduces a totally un-CL-like
> semantics is extremely difficult.  Most of the people who are good
> enough at CL to do it (I'm certainly not one of them) are also
> experienced enough to know when it's the right choice.

Any sizable Lisp applications will make extensive use of macros. Emacs
and magic ( the web framework) come to mind. My experience has shown
that nobody but the person who writes the DSL extension can maintain
their code. The benefits of extending a language in a domain specific
manner are exaggerated. My observation is that macros are important to
Lisp and it's derivative because they lack libraries to begin with.
Common problems solved using macros in Lisp and friends are solved
using specialized libraries in most other languages. And I like the
specialized libraries route. Meta-programming just doesn't tickle my
fancy. It just spells maintainance nightmare.

> And Lisp environments all support getting the macroexpansion,
> documentation, and source of any unfamiliar macro you might happen
> upon, so really this is not as much of a problem as you might
> fantasize it to be.

How's this a good thing? I don't need a Python environment to grok
Python code.

> I don't agree with a lot of what you say in this paragraph, but I
> you're right that libraries are crucial.  That's why I wish there were
> more people writing Lisp libraries instead of being scared away by
> sheer fabrications like the stuff that's appearing in this thread.

People only contribute to things they understand and appreciate. More
people would be writing Lisp libraries if it was worthwhile.
Apparently, it doesn't seem to be. A few years ago, I tried to write an
editor is Scheme. The experience was appalling. I was able to write a
fully functional prototype editor in less than a week in Python.
Shockingly, at the time, I had no experience in Python. Guess which
community I was inclined to contribute to afterwards. I hear stories
similar to mine time and again, yet the Lisp community won't take heed.
They'd rather squeal about the superiority of macros and whine about
their frustrations in Python news groups.