Proper or well formed Lists

[Francesco Cesarini]

A well formed list follows the definition List = [Term|List] or []. Why
where non proper (or well formed) lists (List = [Term|Term] ex:
[hello|world]) allowed in the language in the first place? 

I am having a hard time seeing the need or intent with non well formed
lists, other than a simplifying run-time evaluations and possibly the
parsing. Wouldn't it have been better to have expressions not evaluating
to a well formed list result in a run time error? 

Regards,
Francesco
-- 
Francesco Cesarini

Erlang/OTP consultant
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