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I'm being sarcastic. People that claim Lisp is superior to other languages are the ones that have to explain why nobody uses it. Personally I think that there
by cageface 11y ago
I'm being sarcastic. People that claim Lisp is superior to other languages are the ones that have to explain why nobody uses it.
Personally I think that there are a lot of good ideas in Lisp but most of those good ideas have been absorbed by other languages now and the ones that haven't (s-expr syntax in particular), are perhaps not really such good ideas after all.
- mikelevins 11y agoNobody has to explain why nobody uses it. For one thing, the claim is an exaggeration. Lisp does get used. It gets used enough to keep a small number of Lisp companies alive. Yeah, it's a niche language; so what? People have been claiming it's doomed for over half a century, and in all likelihood will be claiming it's doomed in another half century. For another thing, the reason people don't use it is obvious: they like something else better. So what? All that matters is that Lisp is a better language for Lisp hackers. It makes them happier and more productive. That has kept Lisp alive. It will probably continue to do so. Its relative popularity--or lack of it--implies little about its technical merits. Technical merit and popularity are at most tenuously connected.