Not caustic? "Short-sighted users", "stupid language designers who believe too strongly in strong typing", "certainly can't be bothered to invent a useful concept for their short-sighted programmers", "dumb people who implement something the simple way, so it becomes complex and generally useless to everybody else", "unlike today's braindamaged CPU's", "just look at what C programmers do when they need lists! shudder".
Sure, you may believe that LISP is the greatest invention since the sliced bread, and everything went downhill after that but even if you are correct — that's still just, like, your opinion, man.
I wrote "not *as* caustic" ... in particular, he wasn't being caustic toward Lee, but rather to the idea of cons pairs being redundant.
It's enough of distinction to make me think I should re-examine what Naggum had to say - in this and in other posts - and not get caught up in any pre-conceived notions I might have had about him.
Consider that you may be eavesdropping on the sort of self-talk the author engages in. The clear reasoning mixed with vituperation makes me suspect he probably beats himself up. There is a lot of worry over being mistaken and stupid.
I'm unfamiliar with the author, so I could be way off base.
It was pretty mild for Naggum. Like the GP I was expecting a higher density of that sort of thing, but maybe my memory is too slanted by his worst flames.
Sure, you may believe that LISP is the greatest invention since the sliced bread, and everything went downhill after that but even if you are correct — that's still just, like, your opinion, man.