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I am one of those people who accepted the lisp religion of "syntax is evil". I have a descent knowledge of python, and I've read a few ruby tutorials. Neither

I am one of those people who accepted the lisp religion of "syntax is evil". I have a descent knowledge of python, and I've read a few ruby tutorials. Neither python nor ruby are lisp. Python is not cool because of generators, list comprehensions, decorators or any other feature. Ruby is not cool because of blocks or monkey patching(im suspicions of anything called MONKEY patching). Ruby and python are cool because of really cool libraries and the way people use these languages, not because they have especially well designed syntax. Instead of arguing about how cool your crappy syntax is, argue about which has the better libraries, which implementation is better, which is used for cooler projects. Non of these languages can top lisp when it comes to expressiveness and flexibility.

steveklabnik 17y ago
>Neither python nor ruby are lisp. You may or may not agree, but you'll probably be interested in Why Ruby is an acceptable Lisp: http://www.randomhacks.net/articles/2005/12/03/why-ruby-is-an-acceptable-lisp http://www.randomhacks.net/articles/2005/12/03/why-ruby-is-a... Covered on HN previously here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=416589 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=416589
- pavelludiq 17y ago
  Yes, i have read that article. Here is my humble opinion: Having 80% of the expressibility, even if you don't need the other 20% that often, does not make you lisp. Which is why the title is not "Why ruby is lisp", but uses the word "acceptable". Its just semantics, and i don't want to argue about what makes something lisp, it wasn't even my main point.
  - steveklabnik 17y ago
    I think "Why Ruby is Good Enough" makes for a better title, I'd agree. I don't think Ruby is Lisp either, I just felt that it went along with your point, that's all.
  - raganwald 17y ago
    Does this boil down to a case of Worse is Better?
    - pmiller2 17y ago
      That is a good question, and worthy of an upvote. My first inclination is to say it is not, because if Ruby really were the "worse" to Lisp's "better" in some measurable, objective sense, then presumably Matz would have created something like Clojure rather than Ruby.
fuzzyman 17y ago
And not being Lisp is one of the big reasons for the success of both Python and Ruby. :-) FLAMEBAIT -> FLAMEBAIT
- Confusion 17y ago
  I fail to see how that is flame bait. It's actually a quite insightful statement that is worth repeating: Python, Ruby and all other languages exist for a reason. The reason is that other languages, including Lisp, are not considered to be equally useful for the tasks for which a specific language is being used. Python is not only not Lisp: it's not Java, not Haskell, not Erlang, not ... Whether it is a good reason, and whether these considerations are sensible, is a separate discussion. Whichever way you put it: they exist and should be acknowledged.
  - pmiller2 17y ago
    I agree. Lisp just plain looks weird because of all the parentheses and the prefix notation. I also can't help get the feeling that even with macros available to me, coding directly in the form of parse trees just might not be optimal. Also, it makes my head hurt sometimes. As I sit here writing this, it strikes me that someone who's using these kinds of things to avoid learning Lisp is a lot like the Python newbie who's discovered the language and wanders on to comp.lang.python complaining about the syntactically significant indentation. As with most matters, I'm inclined to believe that Lisp's problem here is primarily a people problem rather than a technical problem.
showell 17y ago
I wholeheartedly agree that all languages should be judged on the quality of their libraries and implementation, as well as the success of the projects implemented on top of them. Ruby and Python have a pretty good track record there. One of the themes of Gary's talk was that Ruby is more expressive/flexible than Python, and lisp was thrown into the discussion as sort of a "gold standard" of expressiveness/flexibility, without necessarily passing any judgment on overall merits of the three languages. To the extent that Ruby strives for more flexibility, it is probably way more influenced by Perl than lisp. As somebody who has used both Ruby and Python fairly extensively, I think Ruby is undeniably more expressive than Python at times, but also more arcane at others. Some of the differences probably come from irreconcilable tradeoffs, where you cannot have your cake and eat it too, but other tradeoffs are probably less necessary, which is why people continue to discuss it. In the case of Ruby, it's a pretty young language, so there are probably opportunities to make it more appealing to a Python mindset without losing its great flexibility, although I do not have specific proposals. The conference Gary spoke at was a Python conference, so most people were more interested in ways that Python could learn from Ruby, without sacrificing Pythonicness. Gary seemed to reach the conclusion that the number one feature he envied in Ruby was blocks. Speaking for myself, I wish Python just had some kind of anonymous function syntax that was more rich than lambdas, even if it were not exactly semantically similar to Ruby blocks.
- Deestan 17y ago
  > I wish Python just had some kind of anonymous function syntax that was more rich than lambdas A lot of people keep saying this, including the article author, and I'm having trouble understanding why. Lambdas are for "one-liners", functions are for more-liners. Any time you want to write multiple lines in a lambda it's trivial to make it a named function. def listSomeTable(name): print name.center(40, "=") def getWeirdNumberPair(cap): while True: a = random.randint(1, cap) b = random.randint(1, cap) if (a==1) and (b==1): continue return (a, b) for i in xrange(20): print getWeirdNumberPair(i) print "="*40 What do you want to use multiline-lambdas for that you can't do (equally simply and elegantly) with named functions?
wvenable 17y ago
Syntax is human. Syntax is ergonomics. A programming language is the bridge between man and machine. Lisp, I would argue, is far more about the machine than the man and that is the simple reason why it's not more popular. Python was cool before the libraries; that's why those libraries got written in the first place. Lisp has been around forever and is still lacking in libraries and other support.
- pavelludiq 17y ago
  "Lisp, I would argue, is far more about the machine than the man and that is the simple reason why it's not more popular." Pleas do, i would love to hear your argument. I fail to see how lisp is less humane than python, when i find it to be exactly the opposite. Edit: what i meant was that lisp is more about the human, not that python is more about the machine, i hope i don't get misunderstood.
  - brettnak 17y ago
    As a non lisp programmer, it is hard for me to automatically see what is going on in a lisp program because of mismatched " ' " and a lot of parenthesis. I believe this is one of his points. When I was learning python, or ruby, for that matter ( I use both! ) I never felt like I had no idea what was going on in the code even before I learned the languages.
    - silentbicycle 17y ago
      Should this really be so surprising, though? Lisp is based on a different model of computation than Python and Ruby. You can't follow non-trivial C code without understanding pointers, or Prolog without understanding unification. Syntax aside, the semantics of Python are intended to be unsurprising to people with a conventional programming background. I don't have any practical experience with Ruby, but it looks like a mishmash of Smalltalk and Perl to me, and I can usually get the gist of code snippets. Likewise, I can kinda-sorta follow written Dutch (since I've studied German and speak English fluently), but I wouldn't expect to be able to just read Thai.
eru 17y ago
Python generators (the ones you can get with "yield") are not just syntax. They can be viewed as a distant relative of continuations or lazy evaluation. Lisp (or lets say Scheme, because Common Lisp is ugly and imperative) does have some nice points. I rather like the syntax. But e.g. strict evaluation by default and lots of side-effects hamper the expressiveness and flexibility of the language.
- j_baker 17y ago
  You do Haskell don't you? :-)
  - eru 17y ago
    Yes, and Clean. I just like to counter those smug Lispians. Lisp has nice syntax, but the underlying semantics is nothing to write home about any longer. Add tail call optimization to Python (and perhaps continuations) and you have something similar to Scheme modulo syntax.
    - pavelludiq 17y ago
      How a python vs ruby thread turned in to Haskell vs Lisp argument i will never know. The essence of Haskell is that its a lazy statically typed functional language, the essence of lisp is that it treats code as data. There is NOTHING stopping someone from making a Haskell with lisp syntax, and calling that lisp, in fact i think there is such a thing. Code as data is such a powerful idea, it is independent of the underlying paradigm of the language, you can have an algol with lisp syntax and it would be lisp, you can have smalltalk with lisp syntax and it would be lisp. Code is data is the only lisp feature you can't take away from lisp, because if you add it to your language, you don't have a new language, you have a new lisp. Thats why lispers are smug sometimes, they know that their language will change dramatically in the future to adapt to the new environment, its the source of lisps immortality, it is destined to be reinvented.
      - eru 17y ago
        Oh, I did not want to create a `versus' argument. Please pardon me, if I did.

steveklabnik 17y ago

>Neither python nor ruby are lisp. You may or may not agree, but you'll probably be interested in Why Ruby is an acceptable Lisp: http://www.randomhacks.net/articles/2005/12/03/why-ruby-is-an-acceptable-lisp http://www.randomhacks.net/articles/2005/12/03/why-ruby-is-a... Covered on HN previously here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=416589 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=416589

pavelludiq 17y ago
Yes, i have read that article. Here is my humble opinion: Having 80% of the expressibility, even if you don't need the other 20% that often, does not make you lisp. Which is why the title is not "Why ruby is lisp", but uses the word "acceptable". Its just semantics, and i don't want to argue about what makes something lisp, it wasn't even my main point.
- steveklabnik 17y ago
  I think "Why Ruby is Good Enough" makes for a better title, I'd agree. I don't think Ruby is Lisp either, I just felt that it went along with your point, that's all.
- raganwald 17y ago
  Does this boil down to a case of Worse is Better?
  - pmiller2 17y ago
    That is a good question, and worthy of an upvote. My first inclination is to say it is not, because if Ruby really were the "worse" to Lisp's "better" in some measurable, objective sense, then presumably Matz would have created something like Clojure rather than Ruby.

fuzzyman 17y ago

And not being Lisp is one of the big reasons for the success of both Python and Ruby. :-) FLAMEBAIT -> FLAMEBAIT

Confusion 17y ago
I fail to see how that is flame bait. It's actually a quite insightful statement that is worth repeating: Python, Ruby and all other languages exist for a reason. The reason is that other languages, including Lisp, are not considered to be equally useful for the tasks for which a specific language is being used. Python is not only not Lisp: it's not Java, not Haskell, not Erlang, not ... Whether it is a good reason, and whether these considerations are sensible, is a separate discussion. Whichever way you put it: they exist and should be acknowledged.
- pmiller2 17y ago
  I agree. Lisp just plain looks weird because of all the parentheses and the prefix notation. I also can't help get the feeling that even with macros available to me, coding directly in the form of parse trees just might not be optimal. Also, it makes my head hurt sometimes. As I sit here writing this, it strikes me that someone who's using these kinds of things to avoid learning Lisp is a lot like the Python newbie who's discovered the language and wanders on to comp.lang.python complaining about the syntactically significant indentation. As with most matters, I'm inclined to believe that Lisp's problem here is primarily a people problem rather than a technical problem.

showell 17y ago

I wholeheartedly agree that all languages should be judged on the quality of their libraries and implementation, as well as the success of the projects implemented on top of them. Ruby and Python have a pretty good track record there. One of the themes of Gary's talk was that Ruby is more expressive/flexible than Python, and lisp was thrown into the discussion as sort of a "gold standard" of expressiveness/flexibility, without necessarily passing any judgment on overall merits of the three languages. To the extent that Ruby strives for more flexibility, it is probably way more influenced by Perl than lisp. As somebody who has used both Ruby and Python fairly extensively, I think Ruby is undeniably more expressive than Python at times, but also more arcane at others. Some of the differences probably come from irreconcilable tradeoffs, where you cannot have your cake and eat it too, but other tradeoffs are probably less necessary, which is why people continue to discuss it. In the case of Ruby, it's a pretty young language, so there are probably opportunities to make it more appealing to a Python mindset without losing its great flexibility, although I do not have specific proposals. The conference Gary spoke at was a Python conference, so most people were more interested in ways that Python could learn from Ruby, without sacrificing Pythonicness. Gary seemed to reach the conclusion that the number one feature he envied in Ruby was blocks. Speaking for myself, I wish Python just had some kind of anonymous function syntax that was more rich than lambdas, even if it were not exactly semantically similar to Ruby blocks.

Deestan 17y ago
> I wish Python just had some kind of anonymous function syntax that was more rich than lambdas A lot of people keep saying this, including the article author, and I'm having trouble understanding why. Lambdas are for "one-liners", functions are for more-liners. Any time you want to write multiple lines in a lambda it's trivial to make it a named function. def listSomeTable(name): print name.center(40, "=") def getWeirdNumberPair(cap): while True: a = random.randint(1, cap) b = random.randint(1, cap) if (a==1) and (b==1): continue return (a, b) for i in xrange(20): print getWeirdNumberPair(i) print "="*40 What do you want to use multiline-lambdas for that you can't do (equally simply and elegantly) with named functions?

wvenable 17y ago

Syntax is human. Syntax is ergonomics. A programming language is the bridge between man and machine. Lisp, I would argue, is far more about the machine than the man and that is the simple reason why it's not more popular. Python was cool before the libraries; that's why those libraries got written in the first place. Lisp has been around forever and is still lacking in libraries and other support.

pavelludiq 17y ago
"Lisp, I would argue, is far more about the machine than the man and that is the simple reason why it's not more popular." Pleas do, i would love to hear your argument. I fail to see how lisp is less humane than python, when i find it to be exactly the opposite. Edit: what i meant was that lisp is more about the human, not that python is more about the machine, i hope i don't get misunderstood.
- brettnak 17y ago
  As a non lisp programmer, it is hard for me to automatically see what is going on in a lisp program because of mismatched " ' " and a lot of parenthesis. I believe this is one of his points. When I was learning python, or ruby, for that matter ( I use both! ) I never felt like I had no idea what was going on in the code even before I learned the languages.
  - silentbicycle 17y ago
    Should this really be so surprising, though? Lisp is based on a different model of computation than Python and Ruby. You can't follow non-trivial C code without understanding pointers, or Prolog without understanding unification. Syntax aside, the semantics of Python are intended to be unsurprising to people with a conventional programming background. I don't have any practical experience with Ruby, but it looks like a mishmash of Smalltalk and Perl to me, and I can usually get the gist of code snippets. Likewise, I can kinda-sorta follow written Dutch (since I've studied German and speak English fluently), but I wouldn't expect to be able to just read Thai.

eru 17y ago

Python generators (the ones you can get with "yield") are not just syntax. They can be viewed as a distant relative of continuations or lazy evaluation. Lisp (or lets say Scheme, because Common Lisp is ugly and imperative) does have some nice points. I rather like the syntax. But e.g. strict evaluation by default and lots of side-effects hamper the expressiveness and flexibility of the language.

j_baker 17y ago
You do Haskell don't you? :-)
- eru 17y ago
  Yes, and Clean. I just like to counter those smug Lispians. Lisp has nice syntax, but the underlying semantics is nothing to write home about any longer. Add tail call optimization to Python (and perhaps continuations) and you have something similar to Scheme modulo syntax.
  - pavelludiq 17y ago
    How a python vs ruby thread turned in to Haskell vs Lisp argument i will never know. The essence of Haskell is that its a lazy statically typed functional language, the essence of lisp is that it treats code as data. There is NOTHING stopping someone from making a Haskell with lisp syntax, and calling that lisp, in fact i think there is such a thing. Code as data is such a powerful idea, it is independent of the underlying paradigm of the language, you can have an algol with lisp syntax and it would be lisp, you can have smalltalk with lisp syntax and it would be lisp. Code is data is the only lisp feature you can't take away from lisp, because if you add it to your language, you don't have a new language, you have a new lisp. Thats why lispers are smug sometimes, they know that their language will change dramatically in the future to adapt to the new environment, its the source of lisps immortality, it is destined to be reinvented.
    - eru 17y ago
      Oh, I did not want to create a `versus' argument. Please pardon me, if I did.