"If you have ever been in a math class with people who are not programmers, who are just plain old Joes, you'll notice that the most difficult subjects have to

"If you have ever been in a math class with people who are not programmers, who are just plain old Joes, you'll notice that the most difficult subjects have to do with abstractions." People who can't think in abstractions shouldn't become programmers, that's all. Besides using very simple DSLs, perhaps (ha!). I don't see how arguing that people who aren't hard-wired to program have greater difficulty with Lisp than they do with languages with more exposure makes the case that Lisp is too complex.