> the Lisp family of languages is not unambiguously more expressive than other languages
Common Lisp is a local maximum in language programmability (code as data, macros, programmable reader, EVAL, COMPILE, Meta-object Protocol, etc.).
> The problem is, most dialects also have some horribly unexpressive things, too. Dynamic scope, cadadr, fifty bajillion words for "equals", stuff like that.
The opposite is true. Common Lisp is its own code generation target - as such it has both low-level (blocks, go to, basic data structures, ...), mid-level (structures, streams, ...) and high-level (CLOS + MOP, macros, ...) programming constructs. Something like the additional dynamic scope expands the expressiveness of the language.
> No M-expressions means that you can't reliably understand the basic structure of a blob of code by simply skimming.
That's unrelated. You can easily read s-expression code as a human. It may only be unfamiliar to you - just like riding a bicycle is unfamiliar when you have never done it. Once you learn it, it's no issue.
(defun foo (a)
(+ a 10))
is no less readable than
defun foo (a)
a + 10
It's only a matter of a bit training. Humans are actually very good at adapting to different sign systems (think about the differences between English, Arabic and Japanese) - each speaker of the various language groups think that the other language is difficult and the own one is natural.
There is a bit of fear against Lisp code - this is partly justified, because of the extensible syntax - but that's unrelated ti s-expressions - one can have extensible syntax in M-expression based variants -> this creates the same problem of unlimited syntactic structures.
M-Expressions are not easier to reliably understand once you have macros in M-Expressions - which current versions of syntaxes similar to M-expressions actually support. See for example the RLISP of REDUCE.
Common Lisp is a local maximum in language programmability (code as data, macros, programmable reader, EVAL, COMPILE, Meta-object Protocol, etc.).
> The problem is, most dialects also have some horribly unexpressive things, too. Dynamic scope, cadadr, fifty bajillion words for "equals", stuff like that.
The opposite is true. Common Lisp is its own code generation target - as such it has both low-level (blocks, go to, basic data structures, ...), mid-level (structures, streams, ...) and high-level (CLOS + MOP, macros, ...) programming constructs. Something like the additional dynamic scope expands the expressiveness of the language.
> No M-expressions means that you can't reliably understand the basic structure of a blob of code by simply skimming.
That's unrelated. You can easily read s-expression code as a human. It may only be unfamiliar to you - just like riding a bicycle is unfamiliar when you have never done it. Once you learn it, it's no issue.
is no less readable than It's only a matter of a bit training. Humans are actually very good at adapting to different sign systems (think about the differences between English, Arabic and Japanese) - each speaker of the various language groups think that the other language is difficult and the own one is natural.There is a bit of fear against Lisp code - this is partly justified, because of the extensible syntax - but that's unrelated ti s-expressions - one can have extensible syntax in M-expression based variants -> this creates the same problem of unlimited syntactic structures.
M-Expressions are not easier to reliably understand once you have macros in M-Expressions - which current versions of syntaxes similar to M-expressions actually support. See for example the RLISP of REDUCE.