Yes, I know how to work around this. No, I do think it is reasonable that I might be forced to work around this while I'm in the middle of doing what should have been a routine security upgrade; remember: the original package is gone, and Ubuntu's Java packages have extra supporting material (such as dpkg-alternatives logic) that is missing from Sun's.

It should also be noted/realized that many Ubuntu users even use the "unattended-updates" package that is provided by the distribution, which means that at some point in the middle of the night all of their software is just going to stop working with no notice. Apple isn't even this insane, and people give them all sorts of flak for theoretically having the ability to remotely wipe apps from peoples' phones.