The closest would be Go because of corporate backing, though Go's most apparent predecessor is all but forgotten and that was with Bell Labs, at least the way variables are declared aren't PASKAL style.
D still has ways to go to make itself safer, despite the safe function tagging, most of the standard libraries don't have many of the functions tagged.
F# and R fill in pre-existing niches, the typed FP (MLs, Clean Haskell, etc) and calculator-on-roids (APL/J, MATLAB, Fortran) niches. Those niches won't overtake anything.
None of them will be mainstream unless "$Language in 24 hours" books are printed for them. Most people learn some particular language to score some particular job downtown, newbs with ample motivation use the first thing they get their hands on (VB6 now C#, the various game BASICs, sometimes C++).
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Anonymous2012-07-05 16:24
Python is way overrated simply because people dont bother to look at the alternatives. The thing that makes Python look nice is its indentation delimiting which makes the syntax look very psuedocode-like. But you take that away and you are left with a scripting language with very inconsistent syntax. Guido designed Python in a piecemiel fashion by simply adding features that users requested, there was no overall plan for the language. So if you compare Python to Ruby you see basic syntax like loops and branch statements dont follow a consistent pattern. Even worse is the OO in Python which is very messy and implemented with a bunch of underscore functions. Javascript is even more consistent as it just uses C syntax, so if you know C, you already know most of Javascript. The prototype OO is outstanding, simple yet powerful. It avoids having to define classes but is not as weak and crippled as Lua tables. Perl is a very good language but requires a long time to fully take in all of its idiosyncrasies, but becomes very powerful once youve learned it well.
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Anonymous2012-07-05 19:48
HANK, YA GOT PROPANE IN YA URETHRA AGAIN!
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502012-07-05 19:49
*perverted laughter* Well I'm sorry Mr. Strickland, I'll be more careful next time.
Since being king of the hill is pretty much a popularity contest, Python will be it. Just look at unis, CS 101 classes, both online and offline, you'll find Python. This is what will end up in the hearts and minds of future generation of programmers.
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Anonymous2012-07-05 22:01
>>49 Perl
"The task of parsing Perl is divided between lex, yacc, smoke, and mirrors."