This really does depend on how "reliable" is defined. At the code level, reliable is dependent on the actual programmer. This code must then be compiled/interpreted in order to to actually function. At this stage the programmer has lost control unless they are also in direct control of the interpreter/compiler - which is, of course, impractical and extremely unlikely.
Inevitably writing in high level languages sacrifices control for how the program looks at the machine level simply because you must depend on existing structures. The higher up you go, the less control you have of the final product. Writing in Python vs. C means that you have to think less about lower level issues and consequently are subject to problems that arise outside the scope of what you could have originally controlled - simply because you didn't have to think about a subclass of issues that you assumed were inherently solved for you.
So yes - if you take a Python program and rewrite it in C, you can get a more reliable program IF you properly solved the set of things that Python took care of for you in relation to your specific problem.
But this relies on the fact that you succeeded in rewriting what Python took care of for you. So we're back to where we started - it all depends on the programmer.
The article implies this in the final sentence:
All that said, I don't recommend using C unless much thought has been given to the decision - the resulting software might be reliable, but it will have taken a significant human effort to produce it.
And this basically negates that C is any more reliable than whatever other programming language. Despite the fact that I think a discussion of reliability of a language is effectively useless (at least the way I've framed it here, I'm open to other interpretations), I enjoyed the article - thanks for sharing!
Inevitably writing in high level languages sacrifices control for how the program looks at the machine level simply because you must depend on existing structures. The higher up you go, the less control you have of the final product. Writing in Python vs. C means that you have to think less about lower level issues and consequently are subject to problems that arise outside the scope of what you could have originally controlled - simply because you didn't have to think about a subclass of issues that you assumed were inherently solved for you.
So yes - if you take a Python program and rewrite it in C, you can get a more reliable program IF you properly solved the set of things that Python took care of for you in relation to your specific problem.
But this relies on the fact that you succeeded in rewriting what Python took care of for you. So we're back to where we started - it all depends on the programmer.
The article implies this in the final sentence:
All that said, I don't recommend using C unless much thought has been given to the decision - the resulting software might be reliable, but it will have taken a significant human effort to produce it.
And this basically negates that C is any more reliable than whatever other programming language. Despite the fact that I think a discussion of reliability of a language is effectively useless (at least the way I've framed it here, I'm open to other interpretations), I enjoyed the article - thanks for sharing!