[robinsonb5]

I think the problem is that some behaviours are undefined where developers expect them to be implementation-defined (especially in C's largest remaining stronghold, the embedded world) - i.e. do what makes sense on this particular CPU.

Signed overflow is the classic example - making that undefined rather than implementation-defined is a decision that makes less to those of us living in today's exclusively two's-complement world than it would have done when it was taken.

It's become more of an issue in recent years as compilers started doing more advanced optimisations, which some people perceived as the compiler being "lawful evil".

What it reminds me of is that episode of Red Dwarf with Kryten (with his behavioural chip disabled) explaining why he thought it was OK to serve roast human to the crew: "If you eat chicken then obviously you'd eat your own species too, otherwise you'd just be picking on the chickens"!