Why is Python popular, while Lisp and Scheme aren't?

[Erik Max Francis]

Michael Hudson wrote:

> Looks like, no.  Acts like, yes -- dynamic nature, manifest types,
> everything's an object (in some sense, not the Smalltalk one).

But surely you're not suggesting that these three features alone make a
language "Lisp-like," a term I'd use to mean something that looks and
acts to some degree like Lisp.

Python surely borrows some ideas from Lisp (naturally; nearly all
languages do), but I would hardly call Python a Lisp-like language. 
Python doesn't look like Lisp, the actual functional features most
strongly reminiscent of Lisp are optional features, and many of the
fundamental things attributed to Lisp-like languages (like cons cells)
are totally missing.

Python "acts like" Lisp in the same way that any dynamic,
manifestly-typed language does.  But surely that isn't what one means by
"Lisp-like languages," because in that case a far better description
would be, "dynamic, manifestly-typed languages."

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