public static Atom condense(Atom firstAtom, Atom[] a) {
		if (firstAtom.isString()) {
			// concatenate list of strings 
			String s = firstAtom.getString();
			for (int i=0; i<a.length; i++) {
				s += " " + a[i].toString();
			}
			Atom atom = Atom.newAtom(s);
			return atom;
		} else {
			// if it's not a string, just return the first one
			return firstAtom;
		}
	}