9 ms·

Wow so all the stereotypes about lisp programmers are true after all

nolemurs 10y ago
Every few months I think to myself "maybe I should learn Lisp," but then I see things like this, and my suspicion that Lisp has been fetishized beyond all reason starts seeming more likely, and I decide to put that exercise off a while more. At this point, I suspect I'm never going to choose to learn Lisp.
- nice_byte 10y ago
  I don't think you're missing out on much. Lisp is probably the least interesting of the functional programming languages. I think Haskell has more interesting ideas if your interest is purely from PL research standpoint. For practical purposes, I don't even consider those languages. Their main value for me is the slow cross-pollination and trickling down of ideas (such as lambdas, type inference, algebraic data types, etc) to more practical, mainstream languages.
  - justinhj 10y ago
    Lisp languages are not even functional programming languages, they're mostly general purpose. Lisps are interesting for other reasons such as the s-expression syntax being similar to the AST, lists and other data structures as first class entities and so on. Also they are very practical languages. Clojure and Common Lisp are used in real world production systems for example. Missing out on lisp is missing out on a lot of interesting ideas.
- rqebmm 10y ago
  My advice would be: Do learn functional programming, don't learn Lisp.
- draw_down 10y ago
  I think it's worth learning. But the idea that it's some glorious font of enlightenment? To paraphrase Frank Zappa, pheeeeeeuw.
  - nolemurs 10y ago
    One of the things that slows me down is that whenever I see Lisp code, my mind goes to the equivalent Haskell code, and the comparison is basically never favorable. I'm a firm believer in the value of learning a functional language, and I totally understand that from a historical perspective Lisp is important, but does it really have much to recommend it over modern functional langauges?
    - marcosdumay 10y ago
      Lisp goes for its simplicity and metaprogramming power. I wouldn't recommend anybody to learn functional programming in it.
    - platz 10y ago
      > my mind goes to the equivalent Haskell code yup, I was doing this too. notice also he did give a nod/mention in the post
    - curuinor 10y ago
      This is clojure so it seems damned modernish
    - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
      You can write functional code in Lisp. But Lisp isn't really a functional language. That is, you have to kind of fight the language to write non-functional code in Haskell. In Lisp, you don't. So if you learn Lisp, you learn a language that transcends programming style. It's much more universal than Haskell.
      - platz 10y ago
        if you learn Lisp, you very quickly learn to lean heavily on macros, which is very much a programming style.
    - rev_null 10y ago
      Yeah, Church-encoding is a lot nicer to use when you can wrap the function in a new type.
- Verdex_2 10y ago
  Just read On Lisp and find a primer on Scheme macros. Then if you're still interested read Let Over Lambda. Few languages do macros like lisp, so it's worth looking at the macros to understand a new concept. Besides that, though, I don't think lisp has anything world shaking. Also if you happen to like what you see in macros, try also checking out parsing words from forth or factor.
  - Apocryphon 10y ago
    The original SICP is in Scheme. Surely Scheme is worth leaning for SICP?
- flukus 10y ago
  The LISP guys spent 40 (50 now?) years telling the world how good lisp is, the ruby and python ones went and actually build cool shit with the language. The later is a better strategy.
  - rurban 10y ago
    On the other hand the one lisp guy produced cool working programs you are not able to understand, while the ruby and python guys solved trivial problems with 100 fragile dependencies, need 10x more time and people to support it. The first is the better strategy.
    - flukus 10y ago
      What cool working programs (emacs aside) would these be? For such an old and constantly promoted language the list of working programs is incredibly sparse.
      - LeonidasXIV 10y ago
        That's already a lot more than the number of cool Ruby and Python programs I use. Going by that metric, we should all switch to C and C++ as they are obviously the way to get software done.
      - rurban 10y ago
        lisp programs are used in the industry mostly. everything which is bit more complicated, and is happy with a one-man dev team. extremely cool apps. open source I only know gmane and sawfish. emacs and autolisp certainly not, these are atrocious dialects. Famous are schedulers or AI apps, such Orbitz and DART. http://www.paulgraham.com/carl.html http://www.paulgraham.com/carl.html https://stackoverflow.com/questions/543579/what-is-the-most-impressive-lisp-application https://stackoverflow.com/questions/543579/what-is-the-most-... and http://franz.com/success/ http://franz.com/success/ have lists.
    - nolemurs 10y ago
      > On the other hand the one lisp guy produced cool working programs you are not able to understand, It's this precise attitude that turns me off Lisp. First, it's not actually that hard to understand. Sure, it's harder than most other languages, but if you've done programming in half a dozen languages (some functional, etc.) Lisp holds no real mysteries. More importantly, being hard to understand is a bad thing. A large part of what makes a good programmer is the ability to write clear, robust, easy to understand code. Yet Lisp advocates seem to love to talk up how hard the language is to learn and how subtle and mysterious it is. I'm sure that appeals to teenage boys, but it is objectively a bad thing! Like, literally - hard to understand code has all sorts of obvious disadvantages, and no compensating advantages over easy to understand code. It's a bad thing!

Every few months I think to myself "maybe I should learn Lisp," but then I see things like this, and my suspicion that Lisp has been fetishized beyond all reason starts seeming more likely, and I decide to put that exercise off a while more. At this point, I suspect I'm never going to choose to learn Lisp.

nice_byte 10y ago
I don't think you're missing out on much. Lisp is probably the least interesting of the functional programming languages. I think Haskell has more interesting ideas if your interest is purely from PL research standpoint. For practical purposes, I don't even consider those languages. Their main value for me is the slow cross-pollination and trickling down of ideas (such as lambdas, type inference, algebraic data types, etc) to more practical, mainstream languages.
- justinhj 10y ago
  Lisp languages are not even functional programming languages, they're mostly general purpose. Lisps are interesting for other reasons such as the s-expression syntax being similar to the AST, lists and other data structures as first class entities and so on. Also they are very practical languages. Clojure and Common Lisp are used in real world production systems for example. Missing out on lisp is missing out on a lot of interesting ideas.
rqebmm 10y ago
My advice would be: Do learn functional programming, don't learn Lisp.
draw_down 10y ago
I think it's worth learning. But the idea that it's some glorious font of enlightenment? To paraphrase Frank Zappa, pheeeeeeuw.
- nolemurs 10y ago
  One of the things that slows me down is that whenever I see Lisp code, my mind goes to the equivalent Haskell code, and the comparison is basically never favorable. I'm a firm believer in the value of learning a functional language, and I totally understand that from a historical perspective Lisp is important, but does it really have much to recommend it over modern functional langauges?
  - marcosdumay 10y ago
    Lisp goes for its simplicity and metaprogramming power. I wouldn't recommend anybody to learn functional programming in it.
  - platz 10y ago
    > my mind goes to the equivalent Haskell code yup, I was doing this too. notice also he did give a nod/mention in the post
  - curuinor 10y ago
    This is clojure so it seems damned modernish
  - AnimalMuppet 10y ago
    You can write functional code in Lisp. But Lisp isn't really a functional language. That is, you have to kind of fight the language to write non-functional code in Haskell. In Lisp, you don't. So if you learn Lisp, you learn a language that transcends programming style. It's much more universal than Haskell.
    - platz 10y ago
      if you learn Lisp, you very quickly learn to lean heavily on macros, which is very much a programming style.
  - rev_null 10y ago
    Yeah, Church-encoding is a lot nicer to use when you can wrap the function in a new type.
Verdex_2 10y ago
Just read On Lisp and find a primer on Scheme macros. Then if you're still interested read Let Over Lambda. Few languages do macros like lisp, so it's worth looking at the macros to understand a new concept. Besides that, though, I don't think lisp has anything world shaking. Also if you happen to like what you see in macros, try also checking out parsing words from forth or factor.
- Apocryphon 10y ago
  The original SICP is in Scheme. Surely Scheme is worth leaning for SICP?
flukus 10y ago
The LISP guys spent 40 (50 now?) years telling the world how good lisp is, the ruby and python ones went and actually build cool shit with the language. The later is a better strategy.
- rurban 10y ago
  On the other hand the one lisp guy produced cool working programs you are not able to understand, while the ruby and python guys solved trivial problems with 100 fragile dependencies, need 10x more time and people to support it. The first is the better strategy.
  - flukus 10y ago
    What cool working programs (emacs aside) would these be? For such an old and constantly promoted language the list of working programs is incredibly sparse.
    - LeonidasXIV 10y ago
      That's already a lot more than the number of cool Ruby and Python programs I use. Going by that metric, we should all switch to C and C++ as they are obviously the way to get software done.
    - rurban 10y ago
      lisp programs are used in the industry mostly. everything which is bit more complicated, and is happy with a one-man dev team. extremely cool apps. open source I only know gmane and sawfish. emacs and autolisp certainly not, these are atrocious dialects. Famous are schedulers or AI apps, such Orbitz and DART. http://www.paulgraham.com/carl.html http://www.paulgraham.com/carl.html https://stackoverflow.com/questions/543579/what-is-the-most-impressive-lisp-application https://stackoverflow.com/questions/543579/what-is-the-most-... and http://franz.com/success/ http://franz.com/success/ have lists.
  - nolemurs 10y ago
    > On the other hand the one lisp guy produced cool working programs you are not able to understand, It's this precise attitude that turns me off Lisp. First, it's not actually that hard to understand. Sure, it's harder than most other languages, but if you've done programming in half a dozen languages (some functional, etc.) Lisp holds no real mysteries. More importantly, being hard to understand is a bad thing. A large part of what makes a good programmer is the ability to write clear, robust, easy to understand code. Yet Lisp advocates seem to love to talk up how hard the language is to learn and how subtle and mysterious it is. I'm sure that appeals to teenage boys, but it is objectively a bad thing! Like, literally - hard to understand code has all sorts of obvious disadvantages, and no compensating advantages over easy to understand code. It's a bad thing!