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From: quale@saavik.cs.wisc.edu (Douglas E. Quale)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.misc
Subject: Re: The powerlessness of Lisp
Message-ID: <1991Mar26.165516.13035@daffy.cs.wisc.edu>
Date: 26 Mar 91 16:55:16 GMT
References: <4637:Mar2102:11:2991@kramden.acf.nyu.edu> <1991Mar21.123512.22876@daffy.cs.wisc.edu> <16060:Mar2515:41:5691@kramden.acf.nyu.edu>
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Organization: University of Wisconsin -- Madison
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In article <16060:Mar2515:41:5691@kramden.acf.nyu.edu> brnstnd@kramden.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein) writes:
>> >typechecking) and pointers into memory. You can do things with memory in
>> >C that you CANNOT even express in Lisp. To return to the original point,
>> Examples, please.
>
>p + i, as I already pointed out. You can find higher-level applications
>(e.g., byte-copying into a character buffer, which can then be written
>portably to disk and read back later) for yourself.

Unfortunately, Dan, p + i is not a program in C or any other language I
know, and I can get the equivalent effect with a null lisp program.
Byte copying is trivial in Common Lisp.  Big Deal.  As far as portability goes,
CL is much more portable than C because it insulates the program from
differences in word size and other low level machine details.  A typical
"portable" C program running on n different platforms is usually n different
programs selected by conditional compilation via #ifdef's.

>
>Other points: GNU Emacs *is* written in C, with only a small amount of
>``helper'' code to implement dynamic typing. Yes, this *does* provide
>all the perceived advantages of a dynamically typed language like Lisp,
>and in this case makes most of the resulting program look like Lisp. The
>total cost is that bit of helper code.
>

Emacs is written in elisp.  Richard Stallman has explained why Emacs *can't*
be written in C.  The major advantage of lisp over C here is the fact that
lisp is much more easily extensible.  You are the only person I have ever
heard claim that Emacs is written almost entirely in C.  I don't wonder why.

>
>Doug, you have made nothing of yourself in this newsgroup but a nuisance
>for at least the last few months. I post a working compose() in C, for
>example, and you have to insist in five separate articles that it
>doesn't work when nested. You challenge references rather than spending
>a few minutes to educate yourself; you repeatedly bring up dead issues
>and ignore arguments and logic that you don't like; most importantly,
>you apparently don't *want* to contribute. Why do you post at all?
>
>---Dan

Actually Dan, I don't post nearly as often in this group as do you because
although I almost invariably disagree with everything you post here, apparently
so does just about everyone else.  (Oddly enough I have much greater sympathy
for your arguments in other news groups.  I don't post there because I
generally don't have anything to add, and often they are matters outside my
area of expertise.  Your posting of compression sources and related discussion
is excellent, the algorithm descriptions very clear and the discussion on
copyrights taught me several important things.)  I follow the discussion,
remaining silent until you make a particularly outrageous claim, or something
important seems to have been overlooked.  More of my postings are sparked by
the former than the latter because you are quite outrageous and folks here on
this newsgroup are quite thorough.

* I only challenge references when I believe they don't exist.  If you don't
* have any personal experience with a particular problem  and don't have any
* knowledge of the relevant literature, don't claim to.

I am amused that you are annoyed that I called you out on Emacs, and completely
ignored my request for the literature you claim to have read showing that
software development and testing is faster in C than in Common Lisp.  I think
you can't provide any such references because I don't believe you have read any
of the literature.  (I also doubt that there's very much of it to support your
fairly unique point of view anyway.)  If you have such references, post them.
I don't need an exact reference.  If you give me the name of the journal and an
approximate date and title I can look it up.

As for compose, your response was repeatedly, "I posted it last month, I posted
it last year, My mother posted it last year...." ad nauseum.  If you really had
the stuff, prove it.  Continually saying something is trivial is not evidence.

Dan, you are a master of evasion.  You claim to have personal experience with
Common Lisp which I doubt. You also claim to have read literature supporting a
viewpoint that I haven't seen in the literature and I doubt you there as well.
You bristle when asked for any evidence that what you're saying isn't just
hot air.  If you had the evidence you wouldn't have to bristle.

Time to stand and deliver.

(I expect another evasion.)

-- Doug Quale
quale@saavik.cs.wisc.edu