Lisp was invented to produce AI. Machine learning is a better way to produce AI. So in a sense, Machine learning takes the needs for Lisp (in AI) away.
Lisp was invented by the guy who coined the term AI, not for AI. Its popularity in AI circles in the past stems from a) being developed by the same groups of people and b) being well-suited for symbolic computation; something that many mainstream langauges suck about to this day, even though it's nothing AI-specific.
ML takes the needs for Lisp more-less in the same way Entity-Component-System architecture takes the needs for C++ and C# programmers...
> A programming system called LISP (for LISt Processor) has been developed for the IBM 704 computer by the Artificial Intelligence group at M.I.T. The system was designed to facilitate experiments with a proposed system called the Advice Taker, whereby a machine could be instructed to handle declarative as well as imperative sentences and could exhibit ``common sense'' in carrying out its instructions. The original proposal [1] for the Advice Taker was made in November 1958. The main requirement was a programming system for manipulating expressions representing formalized declarative and imperative sentences so that the Advice Taker system could make deductions.
So it was designed for the 'Advice Talker'. The AI domains were natural language processing and common sense reasoning.
ML takes the needs for Lisp more-less in the same way Entity-Component-System architecture takes the needs for C++ and C# programmers...