Look at this piece of code: https://github.com/erlang/rebar3/blob/master/src/r3.erl#L32-...
In this example the keyword "end" ends with "", ";", and "." all within 6 lines of each other.
In this example the keyword "ok" ends with "" and ";".
In this example `Self` "exclamation marks" `Ref`.
All of this is easily understood with some experience but you have to admit that `erlang.send(Self, Ref)` is much more easily understood than some symbol that has to be googled. And consider this, a junior dev is going to be overwhelmed with all the syntactic sugar. They're just learning how to define and call functions.
All of these issues matter if your goal is to on-board as many hobbyists and juniors as possible. (Which shouldn't be the goal of every language).
I'm very happy with Erlang. I don't want it to change.