I was actually speaking of the original finalize method it Java[1]. There's no guarantee that it will be called, there's no guarantee when it will be called if it is, and as a result it shouldn't be used to reclaim resources or much of anything, really. Where "should" is so strong in this case that I've never seen it in the wild, even given the N-monkeys code that I have seen.

[1] http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=1216151&seqN...