These languages you are referring to are at least consistent. PHP's only consistency is knowing your going to have to look up what ever method you want to use because there isn't a real naming convention, or even parameter ordering. The other horror of PHP is they throw in features to try to make it look like it has features other languages have. It's like someone says, hey that popular, lets throw it in PHP. Then they do a horrible implementation of it. (See namespacing, PHP OO, etc) Much like basic once had, the only thing it has going for it is its ubiquity.
No excusing PHP. No pretending its just as bad as any other language. It is a horrible nightmare to work with.