Re: Where to find good lisp critiques?

From: Kent M Pitman (pitman_at_nhplace.com)
Date: 12/03/03

  • Next message: Pascal Costanza: "Re: Where to find good lisp critiques?" 
    Date: 03 Dec 2003 09:03:36 -0500

    sstern42@yahoo.com (Sebastian Stern) writes:

    > But, to pour more oil on the fire, here is a quote from Guy L. Steele,
    > from the same mailing list:
    >
    > "Common Lisp with proper tail recursion and call/cc WOULD be a better
    > language."

    I think I probably disagree.

    Now, are you going to believe him just because he authored the original
    language spec? For that matter, are you going to believe me just because
    I edited the more recent language spec?

    My point here is that Steele's statement (or anyone's--mine, for example)
    that something would or would not make the language better does not, in
    and of itself, prove anything. Unless you're just blindly playing follow
    the leader.

    Absent a statement of what "better" means and possibly also why these
    things achieve "betterness", it's hard to even debate.

    I've said it before, and I'll say it again: There is no Good nor Bad in
    the abstract concept of Language Design. Good and Bad exist within a
    design context working toward a specific langauge with a specific set of
    known goals. They are not absolutes.

    So I guess you accomplished your goal of pouring oil on the fire: you
    got a lot of thick smoke that makes it harder to see what's going on.

  • Next message: Pascal Costanza: "Re: Where to find good lisp critiques?"

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