I've heard all of these arguments in support of Lisp for many years, but I'm still not convinced. Indisputably, Lisp is remarkable and holds a special place in the pantheon of programming languages. Every argument in it's favor makes sense, a lot of sense. Reading these arguments in favor of Lisp is not like reading a blog touting the benefits of Javascript where even the positive points don't really sound so positive. The arguments made for Lisp are persuasive.<p>Lisp is different. It's really quite unique; it has an elegant simplicity underlying its implementation and a deep connection to the foundations of computation. Think of this, Gregor Kiczales's book Art of the Metaobject Protocol was published 23 years ago! I learned to program in Lisp 40 years ago. What other languages did I use back in those days? Assembly language (IBM 360, CDC 6600, IBM 1130, etc), PL/1, Fortran, APL, COBOL. Nobody, argues today that we should be trying out PL/1 or we should give COBOL a try. (Are there any projects on Github using these languages from our hazy, distant past?) Lisp's beauty and power have kept it alive and vital all these years. But, there's something wrong with this story.<p>If Lisp is really so great, why hasn't it triumphed? I use Lisp all the time: my editor needs it during periodic tune ups. However, I can't think of when I've reached for it first when I've had a choice. Python is just easier to get things done in. If my programs don't run fast enough I don't think of Lisp, I think of C or C++. Haskell is where it's at as far as programming language research goes, not Lisp.<p>The important observation is that it's not just me. Lisp has had time to prove itself. It made it to the finals, and it deserves the lifetime achievement award. We can honor it's beauty, it's longevity, it's power, and even it's fantastic reincarnations (Clojure), but this isn't enough. If Lisp really was the language that we should be programming in, it would have demonstrated it by now.