How Lisp Became God's Own Programming Language
Lisp - oh what it could have been. It had such potential, but then it got broken. I find it fascinating that those who are dedicated to the proselytisation of Lisp don&#x27;t see the brokenness of the language. For them, all of the broken things are the features of the language.<p>Scheme was one attempt to fix some of those flaws.<p>In latter times, we see the development of Kernel to fix other flaws.<p>So many second class citizens, so many exceptions to the rule.<p>I am going through the source code for Maxima CAS (written in Lisp) and in so many ways, it&#x27;s a mess. I am not at all disparaging those who have been involved in writing the Maxima CAS system and its source. They have done an incredible job and what they have achieved is remarkable.<p>However, like any software system of any complexity in any language, it has lots of areas that are difficult to maintain, let alone advance. In that regard, Lisp has not been as an advantageous language as it could have been.<p>Lisp (as in Common Lisp and its add-ons) is not a simple language and it is not a consistent language (see CLHS - Common Lisp Hyper Spec docs).<p>When I first came across it in the latter 1970&#x27;s, I thought &quot;wow&quot;. But its flaws quickly came to the fore.<p>So, there is no way that it would ever be God&#x27;s own programming language. Especially since, God doesn&#x27;t need to program, that&#x27;s just for us very limited mortals.