Re: a note on extended addressing lisp for 20's

[JoSH <JoSH at RUTGERS>]

The idea under consideration is to ditch the current format
completely, rewrite the whole assy. language kernel (much
smaller than Maclisp's), and use two-word cons cells.  The 
comparison shouldn't be made between this and a standard 
pdp10 lisp, but between this and another "big" lisp (say on VAX).
such a lisp would need a similar amount of physical memory
for a similar list structure (unless cdr-coded [is NIL cdr-coded?]),
and we would regretfully leave behind the innocent days of our
youth when everything could fit into 18 bits (or 16, or 12, ...).
--JoSH
ps: to clarify: the question is, "Is there any compelling reason
why, given you need a large address space lisp, not to write one
for a 20 (as opposed to, say, a VAX, assuming that you would have
to start fresh either way)?"