I can't speak for Ruby, but in both Java and Python I've never seen a bug this embarrassingly bad. I mean, this bug simply would not have happened in a language with a working boolean type, or with exceptions (I trust the ZeroMQ guy's judgement about as far as I can throw him).

What do you think the Java runtime is written in? The Ruby runtime? The Python runtime?

Hint: it starts with a C.

If you build a house in a swamp, you are in trouble.

Wow, you're daft. Everything is, ultimately, getting turned into machine code. Not even Lisp Machines could get away from this fundamental fact: http://funcall.blogspot.com/2009/04/some-lisp-machine-minuti...

> Bogus objects — properly tagged words with invalid addresses that pointed at uninitialized memory or into the middle of object of a different type — which would cause the GC to corrupt memory would be left in registers or on the stack. These sort of problems were everywhere in the microcode.

Go build your cabin in the woods now.

Sure one can corrupt memory on a Lisp Machine. System software like the micro code or the garbage collector can contain bugs.

Something like a buffer overflow was very very rare. This was not a systemic problem like it is in C.

> The Python runtime?

Why, Python, of course![0]

[0] - http://pypy.org/

(I jest, your point is entirely valid)

I was making a joke....

If C is the wrong choice, what is the right choice?

In a couple years or so, my bet would be on Rust.

Java has several runtimes. The most popular one is Hotspot and written in C++.

You can write the Python runtime in something other than C:

http://pypy.org/

And there are Java compilers and runtimes written in Java, and Lisp compilers written in Lisp, etc.