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Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp?

References <f51999a3-3302-4a7f-bfdb-756983e72fe3@googlegroups.com>
From Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com>
Date 2014-01-03 15:30 +0530
Subject Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp?
Newsgroups comp.lang.python
Message-ID <mailman.4843.1388743262.18130.python-list@python.org> (permalink)

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On Fri, Jan 3, 2014 at 12:16 PM, Chris Seberino <cseberino@gmail.com> wrote:
> I've heard it said, by no less a guru than Peter Norvig, that Python is a lot like Lisp without the parentheses.... at least for the basics of Python.
>
> For pedagogical reasons, I'm wondering if it would be easy to implement a big subset of Python in Scheme.
>
> The basics of Scheme or Lisp are amazingly easy to implement.

Because parsing and unparsing (aka printing) are so trivial for s-expressions

> Would implementing a subset of Python in a Scheme subset be a clever way
> to easily implement a lot of Python?

At the innards of lisp and python are garbage collected data structures.
Building one with the other gets you that for free
[Doing it in a lower level language like C is what invokes the humorous:
Greenspuns tenth law]
So yes in that one respect what you say is true.
But then theres also (apart from parsing) all kinds of semantic differences eg:
- exceptions
- modules
- OOP milarky
- C interfacing in Baskin Robbins number of flavours
- carefully crafted portable veneer on top of intrinsically non portable OSes

All these have to be handled one way or other

>
> (This isn't for practical reasons....I'm just curious.)

A crucial difference between python and lisp is that python is
practical and lisp is utopian

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Thread

Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"?  So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Chris Seberino <cseberino@gmail.com> - 2014-01-02 22:46 -0800
  Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 15:30 +0530
    Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Chris Seberino <cseberino@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 08:50 -0800
      Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Rustom Mody <rustompmody@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 23:03 +0530
  Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Devin Jeanpierre <jeanpierreda@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 09:10 -0800
    Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Chris Seberino <cseberino@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 09:26 -0800
      Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Devin Jeanpierre <jeanpierreda@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 10:32 -0800
        Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Chris Seberino <cseberino@gmail.com> - 2014-01-03 22:48 -0800
    Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"? So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Roy Smith <roy@panix.com> - 2014-01-03 12:26 -0500
  Re: Is Python really "Lisp without parentheses"?  So would it be easy to *implement* a lot of Python in Scheme/Lisp? Steven D'Aprano <steve+comp.lang.python@pearwood.info> - 2014-01-04 07:38 +1100

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