Comment by js8

Some time ago, there was a comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48849015

I deeply disagree with the light vs dark framing. I think the real tension between "hacker languages" and "blub languages" is the expectation to modify the language by it's user.

And this is true for dev tools as well. Hackers prefer modifiable environments (such as Emacs), while corporations prefer standard environments (IDEs) to which programmers will adapt.

(As the saying goes: "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." Might be why Paul Graham preferred founders with non-blub languages after all, nothing to do with Lisp as such.)

But to be able to adapt the environment, one must understand it. Therefore the pull to make it simpler, a set of universal tools, rather than a complicated machine with many features and ease of use through following prescription.