For everyone who has only ever seen a Python, plus a language or two that Python has shared a common ancestor with, Python is self-evidently the platonic ideal

For everyone who has only ever seen a Python, plus a language or two that Python has shared a common ancestor with, Python is self-evidently the platonic ideal of an easy language. Though I had exposure to Python before various lisps, I see most lisps as simpler to learn than Python. But I also see the Python ecosystem as easier to StackOverflow your way to something that does the task at hand. But this is just, like, my opinion. I've also taught and watched teaching of roughly the same data science curriculum to total novice Python programmers and total novice R programmers (R being very lispy). The R classes pretty much universally run laps around the Python classes. Again, just anecdata, because the Python classes tended to be attended by hard sciences people (e.g. physics) while the R classes tended to be attended by social scientists. From that experience, I have a hypothesis that either 1) R is easier for beginners than Python, 2) the R ecosystem is better for quantitative research science, or 3) social scientists are smarter than physicists.