Orthogonality in LISP

• Few basic syntax primitives:
  • List Access: car, cdr
  • List Construction: cons, list
  • Predicates: null, equal
  • Control Constructs: cond, defun, recursion
  Rest of the language is boot-strapped from these
• Few basic semantic rules:
  • Everything returns a value!
  • Evaluation rule of lists has few exceptions
  • Program construction through Function composition