spx2,
Typically, you would store the result of the long expression in a variable with a shorter name if you need to re-use the results in a number of later statements. That really isn't needed here but I have included it as it comes in handy. 
my $name = $tree->ancestor->son->sibbling;
if ($name =~ /john|jacob|jingle|heimer|smitz/) {
    # ...
}

[download]
There are a number of different ways to check to see if the value is in a list. I provided a regex alternation but there is also grep or, for the truly bizarre, Quantum::Superpositions. Note: the alternation regex can be constructed using join.

Minor update regarding the reason why you store the result in a shorter variable.

Cheers - L~R

In reply to Re: a natural way of expressing things by Limbic~Region
in thread a natural way of expressing things by spx2

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