Thanks for detailed reply. I appreciate it. First let's get the emotion color out. Whether someone think "intuitive" or "like" is arbitrary -- depend on experi

Thanks for detailed reply. I appreciate it. First let's get the emotion color out. Whether someone think "intuitive" or "like" is arbitrary -- depend on experience and will change. For example, I have been thinking problems in Einstein notations for decades, so the syntax just seems natural to me, but I know other people may not think so, (I know this from my colleagues who have the same work context and known to be smart). So absolute verdict of "like" or not is of no value. It is more meaningful when we compare the alternatives -- rather than just saying you don't like it, it would be more interesting to hear what alternative you like. For me, it is comparison of Einstein notation and the full-blown nested loops. Now what I really want to clarify is what I mean the language layer and syntax layer. (Often existing vocabulary fall short when describing ideas you are not used to so bear with me if you find term "language layer" inappropriate.) Think about programming a factorial function in C and in a functional language such as Haskell. In C, you probably will write a straight loop; in Haskell, it will be a recursion. The languages have its mandates and force us to write code accordingly. That is what I mean the language layer. Now think about the loops, we can say for(i=0;i<n;i++) or for(i=0:n) or loop(n) Some of them may be unfamiliar, but they all mean the exact same thing -- resulting exact the same machine code. Syntax layer does not alter your code. We can use Chinese keywords instead of "if", "while", "for", and we will write the exact same C. Now look at the current situation: except pure macros like m4, every so called programming language force to program differently at fundamental level: with different data types, static become dynamic, swapping out libraries which changes fundamental algorithm, etc. Then, all these new language sugar coat their syntax to make you think you are just changing into a better syntax to lure you in. Once you are in, you suddenly realize every thing has changed and it become obvious that you can't program in your old language with the same kind of experience anymore, and worse yet, you find yourself eager to defend your position and zealously fights the language war, at the syntax front. PS: If expression fits your mind, then it is intuitive because you don't have to think extra. If expression does not fit your mind, and you have to think extra to understand then it is not intuitive. So English is intuitive as long as you think in English. I do. PS2: There is an interesting study with people in Hong Kong who speaks both Chinese and English. The research found questionnaires in Chinese or English results in different statistics. So apparently, there is more than syntax layer difference between English and Chinese. On the other hand, dialects such as Cantonese and Mandarin are probably just syntax layer difference -- maybe this can even be applied to Latin and French.