RISC vs CISC is nonsense.

Pre-RISC CPU designs were pragmatic responses to the design constraints of their time. (expensive memory, poor compilers)

RISC was a pragmatic response to the design constraints of its time. (memory becomes less expensive, transistor budgets are tight, and compilers are a little better)

Post-RISC designs of today are, also, only pragmatic responses to the design constraints of today. Those constraints are different than they were in the 80s and 90s.

The supposed dichotomy is just utter horseshit. It was invented as a marketing campaign to sell CPUs. It was canonized by the most popular text books being written by /Team RISC/.

I wish, as an industry, we’d just get over it, move on, and stop talking about it so much.