July 19, 2002. Q: Why doesn’t the Java language support multiple inheritance? A: Whenever you find yourself asking why Java has or does not have some feature, consider the design goals behind ...

Java’s single inheritance limitation is usually not a problem in the normal course of development. In fact, the need to use multiple inheritance could be a sign of a bad design.

To quote Bjarne Stroustrup, "Multiple inheritance is like a parachute. Most of the time you don't need it, but when you do need it, you really need it." In the early days of C++, before templates ...