> For instance, if I'm just walking arena-allocated memory, the borrow checker does nothing for me. The borrow checker is most useful when you are using it in

> For instance, if I'm just walking arena-allocated memory, the borrow checker does nothing for me. The borrow checker is most useful when you are using it in a team or just using external Rust code. By forcing code to be explicit the borrow checker ensures that most, if not all, implicit restrictions are propagated through the codebase. Naturally this makes Rust far easier to compose than C. > Also I think C plays an important pedagogical role. When writing C you learn a lot about what a computer actually does, whereas with Rust you're working with an abstract system. C is to modern hardware like the Intel 8086 is to an Intel Xeon Platinum. The mere fact that ISO C runs on some many different types of architectures and platforms proves that C is far removed from any particular computer's mode of operation (which isn't a bad thing). Even programming in machine code wouldn't reflect a CPU's true mode of operation because of things like Macro-op Fusion, Register Renaming, TLBs, etc. Processors nowadays are probably the most dynamic and complex "programs" seen in the industry. If C and Rust were graded on "similarity" to hardware, then C would be neighbours with Rust and hardware would be located ten timezones ahead. > I think a lot of the reason C gets a bad rap is because it has been used historically in a lot of use-cases where a language with better safety guarantees would have been a better fit, but that alternative didn't exist until maybe quite recently. Ada is only eight years younger than C, Pascal pre-dates C, etc. There were alternatives but people used what they knew and what their systems were written in. But to be fair, it is far easier to find new languages and tools today than it was pre-internet. However, the problem with C being used in inappropriate places hasn't gone away. People still push to write new applications and software in C despite the safety problems and developer ergonomics.