Python vs. Lisp -- please explain

[Donn Cave]

Quoth Steven D'Aprano <steve at REMOVETHIScyber.com.au>:
...
| Do you honestly believe that the CPU doesn't have to interpret the machine
| code, or are you just deliberately playing silly buggers with language?

I don't care whether the CPU has to interpret machine code.  Are
you suggesting that we might in normal conversation wish to use
the term interpreter to mean CPU, like "what kind of interpreter
does your computer have?", that kind of thing?

| > Your paragraph above that starts with "No of course not",
| > even omits a point that everyone understands, you can in
| > fact expect a .py file will work independent of machine
| > architecture - like any interpreted language.
|
| Amazing. In your previous post you were telling everybody how the
| *disadvantage* of interpreted programs is that they won't run unless the
| interpreter is present, and in this post you are telling us that
| interpreted languages will just work. What happened to the requirement for
| an interpreter?

Look, this is my last post on this matter, because you have evidently
reached a point where every statement has to be spelled out in excruciating
detail to avoid absurd interpretations.  "will work independent of machine
architecture" does not declare that it is absolutely guaranteed to work -
after all, it may have some other flaw that will prevent it from working
anywhere.  It just says that if it doesn't work, it isn't because it
tried to execute on the wrong machine architecture - the file is machine
architecture independent.  You know that, you know I know that.  What
is the fucking problem?

| In order to force "interpreted language" and "compiled language" into two
| distinct categories, rather than just two overlapping extremes of a single
| unified category, you have to ignore reality. You ignore interpreted
| languages that are compiled, you ignore the reality of how machine code is
| used in the CPU, you ignore the existence of emulators, and you ignore
| virtual machines.

Anyone with an interest in computer programming is likely to know what
microcode means, that there are emulators, virtual machines, etc.  You
might find the UCSD Pascal system interesting, to harken back to the
early days of my experience with computers, a fascinating twist on the
interpreted/compiled story.  Interesting as perspective, but it wouldn't
change the way we apply these words to Python.

	Donn Cave, donn at drizzle.com