Why assert is not a function?

[Chris Angelico]

On Wed, Mar 3, 2021 at 10:22 AM Mirko via Python-list
<python-list at python.org> wrote:
>
> Am 02.03.2021 um 23:09 schrieb Stestagg:
> > Ignoring the question about this feature being particularly useful, it
>
> It is useful because "assert" is primarily (if not purely and
> exclusive) a debugging tool during development and testing.
>
> In production code you don't want any asserts, but logging. Having
> "assert" being a function would make it much harder to get rid of it
> in production code.
>

Really?

if PRODUCTION:
    def assert(*a, **kw): pass

would work if it were a function :)

ChrisA