[swatow]

I agree it's bad habit, but I don't see it in the article.

The article goes to great length to argue why Java should use the same terminology as other languages. I would not say that the statements:

Sun wanted to push Java as a secure language, and one of Java's advantages was that it does not allow pointer arithmetic as C++ does.

They went so far as to try a different name for the concept, formally calling them "references". A big mistake and it's caused even more confusion in the process.

can be called "actively trying to misunderstand people". In fact it shows an understanding with the position he's arguing against.

[DonHopkins]

One amusing artifact of that leaky abstraction is "java.lang.NullPointerException". How is that even possible, if Java doesn't have pointers under the hood?

[Tobani]

There are no claims that Java doesn't use pointers. You just don't have direct access to them. Also i don't. Think the entire purpose was to hide pointers for correctness sake but to make the memory model consistent across plarforms.