At the risk of giving a "me too" answer, if you try it you'll see...

If you study computer languages, you're likely to get the impression that it's at least half about parsing. If you learn Lisp, you'll realize parsing the surface syntax is nothing more than a convenience for people (like most of us) who don't like Lots of Irritating Single Parentheses.

Then you could realize that a big price was paid for that convenience. In Lisp it is trivial for a program to build another program and execute it. In other languages it is an advanced technique, like doing multiplication in roman numerals.

Of course, nearly everybody would ask "who needs to do that?" Well, you could very well see that it opens up a whole vista of things you never even realized you couldn't do before. You can do it in other languages, but not nearly so easily.

INSERTED to answer IzKata comment:
The SHRDLU natural-language-understanding program worked by translating an English statement or question into a program in a Lisp dialect called MICRO-PLANNER and executing it.
Programs that manipulate programs, for example to simplify them or prove them correct are naturally written in Lisp.
I used program generation in a program to comprehend visual scenes, where it had to deal with all the symmetries capable in 3-dimensional objects, without multiplying the code.
Anything having to do with logic and theorem-proving deals in manipulating logical expressions, which are a form of program.
Symbolic math, such as symbolic integral or differential calculus, involves manipulating math expressions, which are like miniature programs.
Any problem involving code generation, or the more highbrow term "partial evaluation", is natural in Lisp. I did this for a database bridge program a long time ago. I did it in C, which was not as easy as Lisp, but I got the idea from Lisp. That was regarded as a technique that almost nobody could do at that time (especially the COBOL-heads). Maybe more now, I hope.
... that's just a few ...

Then you realize some things that are considered "modern" today have been old-hat in Lisp for 40-some years. Like functional programming. Like garbage collection. Like closures.

That's not to say modern languages don't have new good ideas, like OOP, etc. But if you learn Lisp it will broaden your perspective.

At the risk of giving a "me too" answer, if you try it you'll see...

If you study computer languages, you're likely to get the impression that it's at least half about parsing. If you learn Lisp, you'll realize parsing the surface syntax is nothing more than a convenience for people (like most of us) who don't like Lots of Irritating Single Parentheses.

Then you could realize that a big price was paid for that convenience. In Lisp it is trivial for a program to build another program and execute it. In other languages it is an advanced technique, like doing multiplication in roman numerals.

Of course, nearly everybody would ask "who needs to do that?" Well, you could very well see that it opens up a whole vista of things you never even realized you couldn't do before. You can do it in other languages, but not nearly so easily.

INSERTED to answer Izkata comment:

• The SHRDLU natural-language-understanding program worked by translating an English statement or question into a program in a Lisp dialect called MICRO-PLANNER and executing it.
• Programs that manipulate programs, for example to simplify them or prove them correct are naturally written in Lisp.
• I used program generation in a program to comprehend visual scenes, where it had to deal with all the symmetries capable in 3-dimensional objects, without multiplying the code.
• Anything having to do with logic and theorem-proving deals in manipulating logical expressions, which are a form of program.
• Symbolic math, such as symbolic integral or differential calculus, involves manipulating math expressions, which are like miniature programs.
• Any problem involving code generation, or the more highbrow term "partial evaluation", is natural in Lisp. I did this for a database bridge program a long time ago. I did it in C, which was not as easy as Lisp, but I got the idea from Lisp. That was regarded as a technique that almost nobody could do at that time (especially the COBOL-heads). Maybe more now, I hope.

... that's just a few ...

Then you realize some things that are considered "modern" today have been old-hat in Lisp for 40-some years. Like functional programming. Like garbage collection. Like closures.

That's not to say modern languages don't have new good ideas, like OOP, etc. But if you learn Lisp it will broaden your perspective.

At the risk of giving a "me too" answer, if you try it you'll see...

If you study computer languages, you're likely to get the impression that it's at least half about parsing. If you learn Lisp, you'll realize parsing the surface syntax is nothing more than a convenience for people (like most of us) who don't like Lots of Irritating Single Parentheses.

Then you could realize that a big price was paid for that convenience. In Lisp it is trivial for a program to build another program and execute it. In other languages it is an advanced technique, like doing multiplication in roman numerals.

Of course, nearly everybody would ask "who needs to do that?" Well, you could very well see that it opens up a whole vista of things you never even realized you couldn't do before. You can do it in other languages, but not nearly so easily.

Then you realize some things that are considered "modern" today have been old-hat in Lisp for 40-some years. Like functional programming. Like garbage collection. Like closures.

That's not to say modern languages don't have new good ideas, like OOP, etc. But if you learn Lisp it will broaden your perspective.

At the risk of giving a "me too" answer, if you try it you'll see...

If you study computer languages, you're likely to get the impression that it's at least half about parsing. If you learn Lisp, you'll realize parsing the surface syntax is nothing more than a convenience for people (like most of us) who don't like Lots of Irritating Single Parentheses.

Then you could realize that a big price was paid for that convenience. In Lisp it is trivial for a program to build another program and execute it. In other languages it is an advanced technique, like doing multiplication in roman numerals.

Of course, nearly everybody would ask "who needs to do that?" Well, you could very well see that it opens up a whole vista of things you never even realized you couldn't do before. You can do it in other languages, but not nearly so easily.

INSERTED to answer IzKata comment:
The SHRDLU natural-language-understanding program worked by translating an English statement or question into a program in a Lisp dialect called MICRO-PLANNER and executing it.
Programs that manipulate programs, for example to simplify them or prove them correct are naturally written in Lisp.
I used program generation in a program to comprehend visual scenes, where it had to deal with all the symmetries capable in 3-dimensional objects, without multiplying the code.
Anything having to do with logic and theorem-proving deals in manipulating logical expressions, which are a form of program.
Symbolic math, such as symbolic integral or differential calculus, involves manipulating math expressions, which are like miniature programs.
Any problem involving code generation, or the more highbrow term "partial evaluation", is natural in Lisp. I did this for a database bridge program a long time ago. I did it in C, which was not as easy as Lisp, but I got the idea from Lisp. That was regarded as a technique that almost nobody could do at that time (especially the COBOL-heads). Maybe more now, I hope.
... that's just a few ...

Then you realize some things that are considered "modern" today have been old-hat in Lisp for 40-some years. Like functional programming. Like garbage collection. Like closures.

That's not to say modern languages don't have new good ideas, like OOP, etc. But if you learn Lisp it will broaden your perspective.