How is ambiguity in selecting from overloaded methods resolved in Java?

Question

package org.study.algos;
public class Study {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
       A a = new A();
       a.m1(null);
    }
 }
 class A {
    public void m1(String s) {
       System.out.println("String");
        System.out.println(s);
    }
    public void m1(Object obj) {
       System.out.println("Object");
       System.out.println(obj);
    }
}

Here, the output is

String null

Why does the JVM resolve the method to one with a String argument?

Thanks in advance J

Answer 1

It's a fairly elaborate algorithm, detailed in JLS 15.12. But the part that is relevant here is 15.12.2, which says "the most specific one is chosen." Both the Object and String overloads are "accessible and applicable" (the String is applicable because a null literal is a reference of all types), and the String is more specific.

EDIT: Corrected section, per Syntactic.