[tarcyanm]

This is why the "STEPS Toward the Reinvention of Programming" (a.k.a. 20k Lines of Code) Project was important. It was spearheaded by computing luminary Alan Kay with help from some very impressive researchers.

The final report is available here: http://www.vpri.org/pdf/tr2012001_steps.pdf

I haven't kept up with subsequent research the Institute has produced. I do know they had an aversion to producing software artifacts and were far more concerned with the written reports (which in some senses restricted the ability of amateurs like me to play with the interesting output by the group). I did play with OMeta (a meta-parser) and the COLA / Id code - which was enlightening!