"Java does not have a place in the small microcontroller (such as the '51) world."

That's a sweeping statement. I agree that Java would be the wrong choice for many 8051 applications but I'm sure it would be good for many others. I know it's easy to become polarised when you're only used to a certain type of application.

We actually use a third party product in one of our systems which contains a fast 8051 derivative - their software layer implements an RTOS, on top of that there's a runtime engine executing our code in some sort of 'half compiled' state. It works fine.