None of the languages you mention is easy enough to be grasped in a week from someone who never did programming in their life. Believe me: most of the people w

None of the languages you mention is easy enough to be grasped in a week from someone who never did programming in their life. Believe me: most of the people who suddenly has to do data analysis for their phd or postdoc projects hardly know how to use excel, so easy of use is essential. Also, you want a non compiled language. Most of the time you do interactive programming and change parameters on the fly, according of the result of the analysis. Finally, matplotlib, one of python's most complete graphic library, is a breeze to use. Making graphs in an interactive way with java or .net is simply impossible. I am a neuroscientist and most people in the field use Matlab. I use python (in fact I use ONLY open source software, by choice). It's amazing how many advantages python gave me on my daily life.