Re: Real-life examples of lexical binding in Emacs Lisp

[Rusi <rustompmody@gmail.com>]

On Saturday, May 30, 2015 at 10:24:49 PM UTC+5:30, Pascal J. Bourguignon wrote:
> Rusi writes:
> 
> > On Saturday, May 30, 2015 at 9:27:25 PM UTC+5:30, Emanuel Berg wrote:
> >> Contrary to this situation, Lisp is right in front of
> >> us. There is no modelling in the world that will
> >> enhance our understanding of Lisp more than we write,
> >> say, 50 lines of it every day. And, doing that, one
> >> might actually do something useful while at it!
> >
> > Some very eminent Lispers perceive Lisp rather differently:
> >
> > | Lisp...  McCarthy did as a theoretical exercise-- an effort to
> > define a more | convenient alternative to the Turing Machine. Lisp was
> > not really designed to | be a programming language
> >
> > From http://www.paulgraham.com/icad.html
> 
> You have to understand what Paul Graham is saying.

Yeah I think I do (at least somewhat).
I just find it hilarious that the intentions behind Lisp were not strongly
theory-oriented.
That they were equally strongly practically oriented I wont dispute.
> 
> But historically, John McCarthy definitely was designing a programming
> language, not just a theorical exercise.  One perhaps may be mislead by
> the way "scientific" "papers" are written, including mere AI Memos.  But
> that's just the "academic" style.  John McCarthy definitely was
> designing a programming language, and this can be shown by the complains
> he had and requirements he made of the languages he had to use before he
> invented LISP, ie. Fortran and Algol.  He wanted a ternary IF from
> Fortran (which was rejected at the time), he wanted a COND form from
> Algol (which was also rejected).  Seeing that he couldn't have his ideas
> integrated in the existing programming languages, he set to define his
> own.
> 
> But indeed, John McCarthy expected to refine a M-expression syntax for
> his lisp programming language; the S-expression syntax was used only for
> data, but since he defined an eval function working on code represented
> as data, and since his student Bertrand Russel...

Student Bertrand Russell?
Now we're into alternate history methinks <wink>

To come back to my earlier request: I would really appreciate some
early key references on Lisp as a functional language.
[And I am guessing that you Pascal will know more about this than many others]

The reason is that the more I poke into this the more interesting (juicy)
titbits come up;
eg Here is an interview McCarthy gave a little before he died
http://www.infoq.com/interviews/Steele-Interviews-John-McCarthy
In the very first question he says he learnt functional programming from Backus' Fortran!!!!!

What do you think of that?!