merits of Lisp vs Python

[Paul Rubin]

"Rob Thorpe" <rthorpe at realworldtech.com> writes:
> > Yes; I'd rather go by what the standard says than rely on
> > implementation-dependent hacks.
> 
> But in that case what do you call Python?  The whole language has no
> standard - is it an "implementation dependent hack"?

This is one of my perpetual complaints about Python.  It does have a
reference manual and library manual, but these manuals are full of
gaps, and in practice one does go by the implementation.  CLTL2 is a
model of precision and thoroughness compared with any document that's
ever been written about Python.