I strongly suspect that they would be replaced by new and more
exciting kinds of bugs.
The problem with smart objects, with constraints and behaviors that
automatically get resolved by the language, is that it's easy to
generate much more weird stuff than you anticipated. (I think that's
the sort of higher-level language you're talking about -- if not,
chalk it up to my lack of sleep.) In fact, I'd argue that the most
common kind of bug in current IF is places where the author didn't
understand, or forgot about, a behavior of the library. That's not a
bug in a low-level feature (like a numeric variable getting the wrong
value); it's a high-level feature working correctly, but not as the
programmer expected.
On the other hand, I agree with Gareth's comment that functional
languages (LISP, et al) *are* the languages of choice for AI, and AI
is a direction in which IF is desperately in need of expansion in. Of.
In. Whatever.
(No, not *the* direction, just *a* direction.)
--Z
"And Aholibamah bare Jeush, and Jaalam, and Korah: these were the borogoves..."