I think it comes down to the fact that PHP does a lot of things right, and its still more efficient all around than most other tools for the problems most people need to solve in the real world.
You can point out all the flaws, but that's like pointing out the flaws in McDonald's. Sure it's cheap food, but it's consistently cheap and there's a much larger market for cheap food than gourmet food.
Perhaps "other language" developers should start thinking of themselves as gourmet chefs. And like gourmet chefs, not many people can afford their products in the real world.
The McDonald's analogy is pretty good since you can also go to any other fast food joint or even cook for yourself more cheaply and nutritiously than you eat McDonald's.
People have sentimental feelings about McDonald's, prefer the style of fries, etc. - it isn't that McDonald's products are incomparable or irreplaceable and that the only alternative is expensive, difficult "gourmet" food.
>and its still more efficient all around than most other tools for the problems most people need to solve in the real world.
How exactly? I always see vague assertions that PHP is somehow better for "stuff I do in the real world", but nothing concrete. Guess what, the rest of the world is real too. I am not writing haskell code for my imaginary friend, I am writing it for real users to use in the real world, and a real business relies on it to provide real people with real incomes to feed their real families. How exactly would PHP be "more efficient all around"?
When I say efficiency, I mean in the economic sense. That the ratio of input it takes to develop some things in PHP is lower than it would be for other languages.
When I say exactly, I mean a precise, concrete example. I've used PHP for over a decade. I have yet to encounter a case where using it was optimal, only cases where using it was required by customer demands. That is why I am asking for a real example of something that is easier in PHP, instead of a vague "some stuff".
You can point out all the flaws, but that's like pointing out the flaws in McDonald's. Sure it's cheap food, but it's consistently cheap and there's a much larger market for cheap food than gourmet food.
Perhaps "other language" developers should start thinking of themselves as gourmet chefs. And like gourmet chefs, not many people can afford their products in the real world.