"If it appears as though it returns a member of ∅, it must hang/crash, because there are no members of ∅." If you want to go with math, think more group theory

"If it appears as though it returns a member of ∅, it must hang/crash, because there are no members of ∅." If you want to go with math, think more group theory. I'm specifically thinking about how you can always create a monoid if you have an associative binary operation, because even if your associative binary operation doesn't have an identity element, you can just declare one. Similarly, if you have "functions" that "return nothing", you just declare that nothing right into existence. Then you can just think of the C language layer basically erasing away any attempt to examine that value returned behind the scenes, because as you say, why?