

Why did John McCarthy "discover" lisp? - mgla

Why do people say that he "discovered" lisp instead of "invented"? Am I missing something?
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unimpressive
>Am I missing something?

Yes.

Consider the parentheses in an s-expression.

(function foo bar)

The s-expression is a universal structure that can be used for every construct
in a lisp. Notice that the core structure is not changed if we replace the
parentheses with say, semi-colons.

;function foo bar;

The core of the concept remains the same. McCarthy's discovery is classed as
such because as a construct s-expressions can be crafted from any set of
symbols.[0]

[0]: This statement is probably false in more ways than one, that still
doesn't damage my point.

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jonjacky
John McCarthy himself said,

"Pure Lisp was a discovery, everything that has been done with it since has
been an invention."

McCarthy said this while visiting a class at Stanford on May 7 2008 ---
according to an eyewitness report here on Hacker News!

<https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=185348>

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jlgreco
The more general question is _"Why is mathematics said to be discovered,
rather than invented."_ People can, and have, written full-fledged papers
about this.

Suffice it to say though, that Lisp is said to be discovered because that is
the terminology typically used with things in mathematics.

~~~
mheathr
It would be strange to claim to have invented something that already existed,
but whose status exists only because people were unaware of it prior. People
did not say that they invented gold when it was discovered for instance.

~~~
informatimago
In latin, discoverer is translated as inventor. They means the same thing. In
French, somebody discovering a treasure can be called "l'inventeur du trésor".

------
fractallyte
Lisp is an expression of the Lambda Calculus
(<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lambda_calculus>).

And here's an interesting discussion that should answer your question:
<http://www.quora.com/Do-aliens-have-LISP>

