> I'd argue that R is much more flexible than Python syntactically. There's a reason that every attempt at recreating dplyr in Python ends in a bit of a mess (IMO) -- Python just doesn't allow the sort of metaprogramming you'd require for a really nice port. Something as simple as a general pipe operator can't be defined in Python, to say nothing of how dplyr scopes column names within verbs.

Well that's just lazy evaluation of function arguments, which can't be done in Python. But if take a look at the Python data model, it does seem super, super flexible. You'll still need strings for column names in any dplyr port though, because of the function argument issue.

Like, both Python/R derive from the CLOS approach (Art of the Metaobject Protocol), but R retains a lot more of the lispy goodness (but Python's implementation is easier to use).