3 ms·
Yes there's something inherent. Namely this: the ability to drop all sorts of requirements off the table, yet still call it some kind of Lisp. It does not need
by kazinator 1y ago
Yes there's something inherent. Namely this: the ability to drop all sorts of requirements off the table, yet still call it some kind of Lisp.
It does not need to be compiled to be a Lisp. It doesn't need arbitrary precision integers. It doesn't need hash tables. Garbage collection doesn't have to work; it can just run out of space and terminate. It can just crash on errors without a trace. It doesn't need to report the line number where a syntax error likely began. You get the picture.
- krig 1y agoI’ll remove even more and _still_ call it a lisp and there is nothing you can do to stop me. Any memory management solution will run out of space and terminate unless there is literally infinite memory available. But I guess hash tables is what people think about when thinking about what makes something a lisp or not.
- kazinator 1y agoWhereas in contrast, you cannot have a race this kind of race for the bottom with most other languages; tripping over the other contestants to see who can remove the most features, yet still have Python or Java. See? There you go, mrweasel; I think we hit the nail on the head.