Modern operating systems are fundamentally unreliable and insecure. The root of this problem lies in the fact that computer languages themselves are not sufficiently focused on error handling, validation, documentation, and security. This makes building reasonable operating systems that much more difficult.

In turn, most computer languages are structurally limited by assumptions that have been around for fifty years or more. Designing a strong language around these assumptions is basically impossible.

The goal of Tortuga is to break as many of these outdated assumptions as possible, essentially redesigning many aspects of programming and operating systems from the bottom up while exposing the limitations these assumptions have been imposing on us.