Java is a poor example of good exception practice, and isn't a strong argument against them, IMO. Java went all-out on a particular (flawed) exception model, and pushed it as far as it could - too far, too soon.

I'm a much bigger fan of Delphi's exception model, for example. You would not normally see any exceptions on an app startup, not least because the default setting in the debugger is to break on exception and it would drive the developer up the walls.