>>127
You don't understand. It's not about demonstration for the purpose of explanation, it's about demonstration for the purpose of proof.
Imagine someone claiming that he considered various possibilities and concluded that spherical cars (which he calls "cudders") are in every possible way superior to traditional car-shaped cars. They have better structural integrity, dissipate less heat, etc. The logic is irrefutable. So you ask, where's your prototype, dude? Are you an engineer or a fucking philosopher? You don't
logically prove that your design is superior, you build a prototype and prove by demonstration, that's the only kind of proof acceptable in engineering.
The blub argument isn't merely about ones ability to judge a language or technique, it's about ones inability to assess it due to ignorance, having failed to fully understand the demonstration.
The Blub argument is horribly misguided, because it assumes that people are supposed to judge a language by learning it, but then they are too lazy and remain ignorant, blah blah blah. People judge a language by observing the programs written in the language. Not even reading them, just noticing that they exist, are developed at such and such pace, have such and such defect incidence, etc.
You don't hear Blub programmers saying that yes, from seeing various useful Lisp programs they can infer that Lisp is clearly superior to Blub, but, sadly, they are too stupid to understand why. What you hear instead is them saying "proofcode or get the fuck out", and rightfully so.