The lisp interpreter can operate on s-expressions, but it cannot operate on arbitrary text. The specialization of encoding as s-expressions allows the developme

The lisp interpreter can operate on s-expressions, but it cannot operate on arbitrary text. The specialization of encoding as s-expressions allows the development of the lisp interpreter. Similarly, a C compiler operates on well-formed C programs. Neither one can do its work on arbitrary text or on the other's text. You can argue whether one is better than the other, but while each is a subset of "text" the limitations of the subset enable the expressiveness. "I work on matter" vs "I sculpt" or "I paint" or "I cook".