ColdFusion: can't tell its null from its... elbow

G'day:
Blimey: Acker is being of some use! He threw me this code last night, and asked what to make of it (well, OK, Sean asked me, but still).

found something unexpected:

a = isnull(request) && isnull(server) && isnull(form) && isnull(url) && isnull(33);

a = true ... meaning all are null

What the actual f*ck?

So I knocked together some test code to make things more clear:

// acker.cfm    
areAllNull = isnull(request) && isnull(server) && isnull(form) && isnull(url) && isNull({}) && isnull(33);

writeOutput("
isnull(request): #isnull(request)#<br>
isnull(server): #isnull(server)#<br>
isnull(form): #isnull(form)#<br>
isnull(url): #isnull(url)#<br>
isnull(33): #isnull(33)#<br>
isNull({}): #isNull({})#<br>
areAllNull: #areAllNull#<br>
");

And on ColdFusion, this yields:

isnull(request): YES
isnull(server): YES
isnull(form): YES
isnull(url): YES
isnull(33): YES
isNull({}): NO
areAllNull: NO


Adobe you dicks. How can an entire scope be null? How can 33 be null??? I looked in the docs ("IsNull()") and that didn't say anything like "oh, we just make sh!t up about what's null or not. To be honest we just don't know. I mean... how can one actually tell? What is null, anyhow?", which might explain it. But no.

Lucee are not lunatics:

isnull(request): false
isnull(server): false
isnull(form): false
isnull(url): false
isnull(33): false
isNull({}): false
areAllNull: false


I despair, Adobe. I really do. Chris Blackwell could not have put this better:

@DAC_dev that's phenomenal. Adobe should extend their boolean type to 'true / false / fuck knows'

— Chris Blackwell (@d1rtym0nk3y) July 30, 2015

Raised as bug 4028246.

Update:

Just an update on this. In a moment reminiscent of the Orwellian position that 2+2=5, Adobe had this to say on the topic of the nullness of 33:

Are you having a f***ing laugh, mate?

And now these're something about Elvis to investigate too...

--
Adam