From what I remember Java is about 15 years old now. Ever since it was released, Java has changed how we do software development. It was one of the first widely used and accepted "pure" object oriented languages. It was one of the best cross platform environments. Java byte code showed that an extra abstraction layer could perform well enough to be a viable option.
Many of Java's ideas and strengths have been copied by other languages and frameworks. These same languages have also learned from some of the mistakes that Java made. Even if Java doesn't become the end-all of software development languages, it will always have a place in history for it's impact on the development community.