I don't know... I also agree that simple AND, OR, and XOR logical operators would dramatically improve the (human-readable) clarity of the expression language, which would make it easier to learn and more powerful. Not having them is like trying to write code for very old bare metal like a PDP-8 or something.
I may be missing something in their use, but I don't see how Search Lists provide the same functionality. Certainly not in many cases, and there are plenty of places where you can't use them (like when using expressions for tagging or quick searches, rather than as a pane).
Currently all expressions you add are effectively "AND-ed" to each other. It is easy to do this in a search:
([Artist] = "simon" AND [Artist] = "garfunkel") : returns only those containing both "simon" and "garfunkel", but not each choice alone.
But, I want to be able to do things like this in a search:
([Artist] = "simon" OR [Artist] = "garfunkel") : returns all artists containing "simon", "garfunkel" and those containing both "simon" & "garfunkel"
and also be able to...
([Artist] = "simon" XOR [Artist] = "garfunkel") : returns those containing "simon" but not "garfunkel", and those containing "garfunkel" but not "simon"
Can you show me how to do all three without using complicated IF-THEN-ELSE logic statements? I'd be all ears! AND, OR, and XOR are pretty essential components of any modern logical language.