Xah Lee, 2008-01-10
[The following is originally posted as a reply in comp.lang.lisp about “Lisp-1” vs “Lisp-2”.]
Someone (Propon...@gmx.net) wrote:
Having read Touretzky's introduction and the first half of Paul Graham's On Lisp↗, I'm wondering what the advantages of a Lisp-2 are over a Lisp-1
It seems to me that a Lisp-2's ability to use a single symbol to represent both a function and a value is a minor advantage, although I'm sure some regard it as a disadvantage. On the other hand, a Lisp-2 requires the clunky, IMHO, #' operator and cannot have a elegant, universal DEFINE like Scheme's.
Yet I've heard that a Lisp-1's macros are necessarily less powerful than those of a Lisp-2. Is that true? Are there some other big advantages of a Lisp-2 that I'm missing?
Please try to avoid the jargons lisp1 and lisp2.
Recently i have just wrote a longish essay on the harm of jargons in functional languages. (See: Jargons And High Level Languages)
The jargon lisp1 and lisp2 is one of better example that illustrate the issue.
• The jargon is opaque. The words do not convey its meaning.
• Being a opaque jargon, it is often used subconsciously by people in a group, to communicate that they are in-group. (a class-differentiation strategy of human animals; as is much of slang↗'s purpose) And consequently, these jargons are thrown about often without the writers actually understanding, or wishing to discuss about it in any way.
Further, this issue is relatively minor, having little real-world practical impact. It is not unlike a war about which end of egg one should crack. (i.e. big endian vs little endian; See: Gulliver's Travels. PART I — A VOYAGE TO LILLIPUT, Chapter 4)
Why is this issue minor? Consider it broadly in human animal's computing activities. I give 2 examples:
Consider that in the 1960 people went to moon. (Moon landing↗) Imagine what complexities involved in the physics, mathematics, computation, at a time when computer are some one thousand times slower than today, using punch-cards, and there are not much computer languages, not even modular programing.
For another example, consider today's PHP language. Linguistically, it is one of the most badly designed language, with many inconsistencies, WITH NO NAMESPACE MECHANISM, yet, it is so widely used that it is in fact one of the top 5 most deployed languages. If one of PHP or lisps and all associated applications written in them is to suddenly disappear from the face of this earth as a catastrophic punishment from Zeus, and all the leaders of nations is to have experts to assess the damage as they do with natural disasters, it is probable that PHP would be a order of magnitude greater loss.
Now, suppose we narrow the scope of “lisp1 vs lisp2” to its context: computer language design. There are many issues in language design. For example: dynamic scope vs lexical variable scope, various models of typing systems (dynamic, static, variable/value based, algebraic types, no types, with or without inference system), computing paradigm (OOP, Functional, procedural, pattern matching, database), evaluation model (greedy vs lazy) ... etc. Among all language design issues, the “lisp1” vs “lisp2” is really one of the least significant, which actually arise practically only in Lisp due to its peculiar concept of its “symbols”.
The existence of a name to a concept or idea, especially a opaque jargon, tends to get people to throw the name and argue about it unnecessarily.
To people in the lisp communities, please stop using the term. If necessary, say Common Lisp's model or Scheme Lisp's model, or, use a communicative term like multi-meaning-space and single-meaning-space.
Now, in the following, i wish to discuss some associated issue. In particular, thoughts on how multi-meaning-space came about.
There's a curious question. Why is the “lisp1 vs lisp2” happens only in lisp, and we don't have “perl1 vs perl2”, “java1 vs java2”, “ML1 vs ML2”, or any language with a variation on this?
This has to do with the concept of lisp's symbol, which doesn't exist in other languages (notably except Mathematica).
Now, a further question is then, why Common Lisp's symbol of a particular name can have multiple meanings? (That is, a name in CL can both be a variable and a function in the same block of code at the same time. (This peculiar fact, we might give it a professional terminology for ease of communication, and we might call it: Common Lisp's multi-meaning-space, or just multi-meaning-space, meaning-space.))
Now, the question is, why do Lisps before Common Lisp have this multi-meaning-space feature?
I do not know much about the technical aspects of Lisp's history. However, i can venture a educated guess.
Old Lisps's multi-meaning-space feature, just like so many of its features (cons, sort destroying its variable, and semi-regular syntax using nested parens, etc), is simply designed as is without necessarily explicit, important, rationales. In other words, it is probably a characteristic that happens to be convenient, easy to implement, or not thought about at the time, or simply went one way than the other. (as opposed to, prominent issues that calls for conscious, explicit, decisions with important ramifications, such as syntax (sexp), symbols system, evaluation model, ...etc.)
Now, as i mentioned before, this (single/multi)-meaning-space issue, with respect to human animal's computing activities, or with respect to the set of computer design decisions, is one of the trivial, having almost no practical impact. And, because some human animals, in the history of their power struggle, is produced the byproduct of the jargons “lisp1” and “lisp2”. And due to the fact that which end of egg to crack is now blessed with a terminology that has all the countenance of impartiality, it furnishes and fuels countless arguments and fightings on this non-issue between the Scheme Lisp and Common Lisp factions, even when the origin of the power struggle on this particular issue (the Common Lisp Standard) has long died. (more specifically, every few months the issue will rise up in comp.lang.lisp or comp.lang.scheme, with all colors and types of activities from sincere to trite to re-examination to political struggle to pacification.)
Note: for the technical details of the Common Lisp's meaning-space, and the origin of the jargons “lisp1” and “lisp2”, see: Technical Issues of Separation in Function Cells and Value Cells↗, by Richard P Gabriel, Kent M Pitman, 1988.
For comments, please go to: http://xah-lee.blogspot.com/2008/01/jargon-lisp1-vs-lisp2.html.
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