[chambers]

It's work of art and a work of science, I'd say. Programming language dev needs both, and I think Java has learned how to do both, at least compared to its messy early years.

On the note of science, I'll credit Java's maintainers for treating their language as a technology and not merely as a product. Many languages respect the real-world physics of computers to stay relevant. Few respect the "metaphysics" until weird bugs keep emerging in the compiler and ecosystem. Bugs that can't be solved with more building, engineering, or even design. Because those bugs are not defects; they come from the concepts & axioms of the language itself, not its implementation.