Are C++ Templates just Macros in disguise?

In my opinion, macros are a bad habit from C. Although they can be useful for some I do not see a real need for them when there are typedefs and templates. Templates are the natural continuation to Object Oriented Programming. You can do a lot more with templates...

Consider this...

int main()
{
    SimpleList<short> lstA;
    //...
    SimpleList<int> lstB = lstA; //would normally give an error after trying to compile
}

In order to make the conversion you can use something that is called a conversion constructor and a sequence constructor (look at the end) along the rather complete example for a list:

#include <algorithm>

template<class T>
class SimpleList
{
public:
    typedef T value_type;
    typedef std::size_t size_type;

private:
    struct Knot
    {
        value_type val_;
        Knot * next_;
        Knot(const value_type &val)
        :val_(val), next_(0)
        {}
    };
    Knot * head_;
    size_type nelems_;

public:
    //Default constructor
    SimpleList() throw()
    :head_(0), nelems_(0)
    {}
    bool empty() const throw()
    { return size() == 0; }
    size_type size() const throw()
    { return nelems_; }

private:
    Knot * last() throw() //could be done better
    {
        if(empty()) return 0;
        Knot *p = head_;
        while (p->next_)
            p = p->next_;
        return p;
    }

public:
    void push_back(const value_type & val)
    {
        Knot *p = last();
        if(!p)
            head_ = new Knot(val);
        else
            p->next_ = new Knot(val);
        ++nelems_;
    }
    void clear() throw()
    {
        while(head_)
        {
            Knot *p = head_->next_;
            delete head_;
            head_ = p;
        }
        nelems_ = 0;
    }
    //Destructor:
    ~SimpleList() throw()
    { clear(); }
    //Iterators:
    class iterator
    {
        Knot * cur_;
    public:
        iterator(