How about shouting up about the lisp this or that and just think of it as a normal programming language with some features that most programmers dont understand because the never learned them in school job.
These lisp geniuses are just programmer that grew up in a time where lisp was often used. So the are "just" programming geniuses.
Lisp does not make medicore programmers 10x better. Its just a very good programming language.
P.S. Back then it did make you much more productive because all other languages where way behind not like knowdays.
Depends on what you mean by "grokking Lisp".
If it means a full exploitation of all the language's possibility, I agree, but it seems a bit obvious that a mediocre programmer would be unable to do that.
If it merely means being able to program in the language, that's not true.
These lisp geniuses are just programmer that grew up in a time where lisp was often used. So the are "just" programming geniuses.
Lisp does not make medicore programmers 10x better. Its just a very good programming language.
P.S. Back then it did make you much more productive because all other languages where way behind not like knowdays.