[jgeralnik]

Just because supposedly a piece of software performing a critical purpose was written in lisp does not mean lisp won the war.

If the software wasn't written in lisp, it would have been written in any other language.

And if the software wasn't written at all there would have been hundreds of people doing the software's work manually instead.

Did the software help? Probably. It's likely there would have been more screw ups if there was no software. But it takes a big leap to credit the software with winning the war.

[lispm]

But there was no other software. It was a logistics system written in Lisp which moved fleets, troops and supplies.

It was based on a decade of research in various planning software written in Lisp.

> And if the software wasn't written at all there would have been hundreds of people doing the software's work manually instead.

How so? How should it work to move hundred thousands of people with hundreds of thousands different types of things between several continents? In a few months?

[jgeralnik]

  the first Gulf War in Iraq was won because a Lisp application took care that US soldiers had everything from toilet paper, ammunition to gasoline

The word because means that if there was no Lisp application the war would not have been won. This is almost certainly false, even if the Lisp application did make things easier.

[lispm]

without that application, nobody would have been there.

[qu4z-2]

Without that application, there would have been another.

[lispm]

It wasn't.

[pretoriusB]

That "it wasn't" doesn't mean that "it could not have been" (which was the point the other guy made).

This is more than an elementary logical mistake on your part, this is pure crazy.

By the same logic all those COBOL and Java applications that are deployed for something major (from banking to taxation to multi-national logistics) prove that COBOL and Java are as good as Lisp (and irreplaceable at that, seeing that "there wasn't something else deployed in their place").

What app was used in ONE war doesn't matter at all to explain which language is better than another.

Lots of far more crucial operation than the logistics in a minor war held by a superpower to a small third world country, used other languages. For example, NASA missions used assembly and C.

Does that prove anything relate to the suitability of those languages in general?

Quit the BS Lisp-proselytisation with bogus arguments and hand-waiving.

[LispShmisp]

Well, if you go as far as to say that without Lisp nobody would have been there... Is it fair to say that Lisp started the war?

[mturmon]

"Thisp aggression will not stand."

[pretoriusB]

LOL! "Coalition for Peace Against LISP".

[biot]

  > How should it work to move hundred thousands of people
  > with hundreds of thousands different types of things
  > between several continents? In a few months?

Have you considered reading a WWII history book? That was a far more impressive and substantial mobilization to multiple countries spanning multiple continents which was done without the benefit of software. It took more than a few months largely because they had to manufacture equipment and recruit/train personnel from scratch.

Either you're doing one epic troll or you're displaying a staggering ignorance of the ability for militaries going back to the time of the Roman Empire to do significant mobilizations.