I agree with the spirit of what you say, but there's a lot of finer points in here. There's what the language can do (syntax wise), what the standard library c

I agree with the spirit of what you say, but there's a lot of finer points in here. There's what the language can do (syntax wise), what the standard library can do, and what 3rd party libraries can do. I agree less syntax is better. The syntax is probably the hardest part, since it is the base. A lot of standard libraries are where the meat is though, and when these are lacking, problems quickly arise. Example: C++ before the STL (yeah, dating myself here.) If you have good syntax and good standard libraries, then you should be able to make good 3rd party libraries. "Language features" I typically lump into the bundle of syntatic sugar. The only time this doesn't come into effect is when you simply can't accomplish the job any other way. Overall, I agree, we should have as few as possible "language features."