From the downvotes I can only conclude that many of you wish the study didn't claim what it claims and are merely shooting the messenger. If anyone can point out rhetoric within the study that qualifies it in such a way as to make comparisons of other statically typed languages with other dynamically typed languages out-of-bounds or expressing a false equivalence within the scope of the conclusions of the study itself, I'll retract.
But so far all of the arguments I'm seeing against using, for instance, Java, are coming from a perspective not advocated by the study. You all have a point -- it's just not the point made by the paper.
To simplify: there is a difference between "static typing is better than dynamic typing" and "all static typing is always better than all dynamic typing". It's basically the difference between ∃ and ∀.
Saying that "static typing is better than dynamic typing" is like the former: there exists some static typing system that is better than dynamic typing. Saying that "all static type systems are better than any dynamic system" is like the second. All the paper ever says is the first: "Based on these results, the conclusion can be reached that while unit testing can detect some type errors, in practice it is an inadequate replacement for static type checking." Note how it never claims to apply for all possible static type systems; rather, it just says that tests are an inadequate replacement for type systems in general (i.e. there exists some type system that catches more errors than tests). This is exactly like my first example.
In summary: a being better than b does not mean that all a is always better than all b. Just because static typing is better than dynamic typing does not imply that Java is always better than Python; it merely implies that some statically typed language is better than Python.
I agree with your characterization in your first paragraph, but I agree with davesims that the conclusions are too strong. If one has to do the level of analysis of the conclusions that you present in your second paragraph, then they are poorly worded. I find davesims' interpretation a reasonable one, which leads me to agree that the conclusions need to be tempered and clarified.
You would do well to consider the very real possibility that it is in fact you who is misguided, and not the rest of the world. You come off sounding childish when you refuse to even consider the possibility that you are simply misinterpreting the purpose and conclusion of the study. The only reason most people can think of to explain your behaviour is that you have an axe to grind and just want to shoot down anything that paints static typing as a positive thing.
But so far all of the arguments I'm seeing against using, for instance, Java, are coming from a perspective not advocated by the study. You all have a point -- it's just not the point made by the paper.