Right, yes: what ships with the language shapes the way the language is used, and has wider impacts beyond what you could theoretically or even practically do w

Right, yes: what ships with the language shapes the way the language is used, and has wider impacts beyond what you could theoretically or even practically do with it. A dumb example would be a Option/Maybe type in Java. You could write a good approximation. But none of the standard libraries would use it, let alone any user supplied libs. Lisps are different in some very important ways, but since this is in part a meatspace phenomenon, it's still a challenge. Somebody went so far as to call it The Lisp Curse[0]. Anyway, syntax is a matter of taste, though I think people focus too much on it one way or the other— people don't like s-expressions b/c parens, people don't like Clojure b/c brackets/braces/whatever. So while I agree that Clojure syntax isn't a huge game-changer, it can and does improve the quality of life for some people, myself included. Built-in literals are a big deal. And there is a lot to be said for being able to use these as primitives on day 1 of learning Clojure, esp. as your first Lisp. [0]: http://www.winestockwebdesign.com/Essays/Lisp_Curse.html http://www.winestockwebdesign.com/Essays/Lisp_Curse.html.