>>> But detecting type errors isn't 100% accurate either.
>>>
>>> int x = 1 ? 5 : "hello";
>>>
>>> That's not legal, but it's not a type violation either.
>>
>> The general problem of determining whether every possible code path is
>> well-typed is undecidable. Type systems insert artificial restrictions to
>> /make/ the problem decidable. Hence, there are expressions and statements
>> which are well-typed, but do not type-check.
>
> Which is the point I'm making.

And I'm agreeing. ;-) [Although I'm not sure I got the technical terms 
right...]

> We put up with saying "that'll never be
> the wrong type, but it's still illegal", so the argument that "whether
> this code is reachable is unsolvable, so we shouldn't even try" is
> equally bogus.)

Well, to be fair, the code you worked is well-typed, but /very stupid/. 
The fact that it gets rejected is no big deal, really.

(OTOH, all the advocates of dynamically-typed languages seem to think 
that this is /the primary reason/ that statically-typed languages suck - 
because you /can't/ just do whatever the hell you want, no matter how 
incoherent.)

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