> But in practice developers misuse features, so adding a feature actually leads to worse code. Is that really a problem on the language's side, though? Devs a

> But in practice developers misuse features, so adding a feature actually leads to worse code. Is that really a problem on the language's side, though? Devs are capable of mis-using any feature, even extremely basic ones that almost every language has (variable names, for instance (although I'm laughing in FORTH)). Code standards and code reviews are necessary tools in the first place because it doesn't matter what language you give a programmer - they're perfectly capable of constructing a monstrosity in it. I argue that preventing programmers from doing dumb things with well-designed language features (so, hygenic Scheme macros, and not raw C pointers) is a social and/or organizational problem, and it's better to solve that at that level than to try to solve it (inadequately) at a technical level. ("I keep dereferencing null pointers", on the other hand, is an example of a technical problem that can be solved on the technical level with better language design)