Although he named it the Python paradox and wrote mostly about Python being chosen by Java programmers, he doesn't think of Python too highly. He mentions Perl,

Although he named it the Python paradox and wrote mostly about Python being chosen by Java programmers, he doesn't think of Python too highly. He mentions Perl, Ruby, Icon, Joy, J, Lisp and Smalltalk. He also speaks about esoteric languages, but based on his other essays, he probably means any language better than the average. Since the average language depends on the type of the program, it depends: - if Java is the average: Clojure, Scala, Groovy, Python, Ruby, Go, Erlang - if Javascript: CoffeeScript, TypeScript, ClojureScript - if C/C++: Rust, D That's not exhaustive and highly subjective of course. And since programming languages are such an important topic of his, any language that is considered the best overall language by clever hackers would fit the description.