[evadne]

Agreed. There is no alternative to thinking. However a good collection of conventions, primitives & building blocks, can assist greatly in architecting a robust system.

We do test systems to the point of breakage. It is not something we skip just because the language is good.

As to existential risk:

I will try to be succinct. If there has been no exposure then there is no need to hedge.

Further, there are commercial firms which will maintain your critical systems. In other words, a long term maintenance contract for Elixir systems can be procured from more than one source.