If you make it an environmental error then the programmer is likely to write an error handler that ignores the error because it can "never" happen and the compi

If you make it an environmental error then the programmer is likely to write an error handler that ignores the error because it can "never" happen and the compiler is forcing them handle it. You now need a linter to prevent this and a way to signal to the linter that "no I really intended to ignore that error, I promise" Whereas exceptions fail safe, ignoring the error means not catching it, which means if the error does occur, it will load up the debugger. This is the whole Java "checked exceptions" misfeature again.