

PHP vs. Lisp: The Gripes About Lisp Are Valid - rw
http://www.findinglisp.com/blog/2008/09/php-vs-lisp-unfortunately-its-true.html

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gruseom
I like his distinction between fundamental dislikes and competitive
disadvantages - sort of essential objections vs. accidental ones.

But a lot of the accidental objections seem not really to be about what they
claim to be. How many people have _really_ hit a roadblock because of a
missing library? (I know I haven't. If I did, I'd probably just write it.) How
often is the "libraries" objection made without mentioning any specific
missing libraries? At least 90% of the time. Probably at least 95%.

So I think one needs a third category: the pseudo-accidental objection. In
other words, to some extent "libraries" is just the "it's too slow" of this
decade. I don't know if it makes much sense for the community, such as it is,
to put a lot of effort into addressing these, since the objections will just
shift to something else. I'm not going to write a library I don't need.

But I'm all in favor of the Lisp community getting its act together and
answering real objections (or rather, addressing real problems) and especially
being helpful to beginners who want to get started.

