I am not saying that at all. If anything I said the opposite of that. I think, given how simple Lisp's syntax is, being able to write/use Lisp is almost trivial. However being able to use Lisp is a way that has given it an almost mythical status (one being discussed in this thread is the so-called "x10 programmer") requires far more than just being able to write Lisp
EDIT: see the problem i have with your post is its tone and refusal to read what i actually wrote. if you read it properly i am not saying anything different to what you seem to be saying: if you are a good programmer you can be productive in any language, including lisp. if you are a crappy programmer, knowing how to write lisp is not going to save you. knowing how to write lisp is trivial. even implementing some (minimal) dialect of lisp is not too difficult
on the other hand, i think that repl-driven development that is available to many (all?) common lisp implementations is unmatched in any language, and i think that this is unique to common lisp. please see the post by mikelevins in this thread that details this process. i think this can be a great productivity booster for production as well as exploratory programming. in any event i enjoy it a lot
… crickets …
Still waiting :)
on the other hand i think people can be more productive in lisp provided certain criteria are met: they are motivated to solve the problem at hand; and that they enjoy and are capable to use the tooling that is offered in lisp to its full extent. but this is not surprising because in order to understand lisp to this extent you have to understand far more about computing than just knowing lisp syntax, which is trivial btw