I was playing with Clojure REPL and when I try to use cons car that existed in LISP, get this error.

 
user=> (take 3 '(1 2 3 4))
(1 2 3)
user=> (take 2 '(1 2 3 4))
(1 2)
user=> (take 1 '(1 2 3 4))
(1)
user=> (car '(1 2 3 4 ))
CompilerException java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to resolve symbol: car in this context, compiling:(NO_SOURCE_PATH:6:1)
user=> (cons 1 2)
IllegalArgumentException Don't know how to create ISeq from: java.lang.Long  clojure.lang.RT.seqFrom (RT.java:505)
user=>
 
 

Looks like these functions are different in Clojure.

Use cons in Clojure like this will output

 
user=> (cons 1 2)
IllegalArgumentException Don't know how to create ISeq from: java.lang.Long  clojure.lang.RT.seqFrom (RT.java:505)
 

It says that Clojure can not create ISeq from the arguments.

If the second argument is vector or list, then is OK.

 
user=> (cons 1 [2 3])
(1 2 3)
 

If the first argument is another vector

 
user=> (cons [1 2] [3 4])
([1 2] 3 4)
 

Other variants

 
user=> (cons '(1 2) [3 4])
((1 2) 3 4)
user=> (cons '(1 2) '(3 4))
((1 2) 3 4)
 

Cons symbol or list of symbol

 
user=> (cons '(sym) '(3 4))
((sym) 3 4)
user=> (cons 'sym '(3 4))
(sym 3 4)
 

Let's see the documentation of cons

 
cons clojure.core
 
(cons x seq)
 
Returns a new seq where x is the first element and seq is
the rest.
 
 

It indicates the the second argument must be a seq.

And the seq in Clojure has special meaning.

seq is a logical list, and unlike most Lisps where the list is represented by a concrete, 2-slot structure, Clojure uses the ISeq interface to allow many data structures to provide access to their elements as sequences.

In another words, sequence in Clojure is not a concrete data structure but an interface which can be implemented in various ways.

If you really want to do it like LISP

 
user=> (cons 1 '(2))
(1 2)