Please don't learn to code

He did say that everyone should learn some basic concepts of programming, which I think we could all agree with. Perhaps everyone shouldn't know how to create the next Gmail, but surely there's an advantage to us all knowing how for loops work and how to write a bit of simple code (perhaps just doing math and text basics in Ruby). Many schools already teach this as a standard part of their curriculum using Basic.

Maybe he just thinks it would be fun, wants to feel the joy of that first "Hello Gotham"? He certainly wouldn't be the first person coding for avocational reasons.

This is a great example. My brother in law is a chef. I asked for his scone recipe, and he said to throw in some sugar, flour and milk (or something like that, I'm not a chef). Mix it until it looks right. That's expertise.

I'm a lousy cook - but I can cook food if I follow instructions that have accurate measurements.

That doesn't mean I shouldn't learn to cook.

I should probably disagree. The point of code being a life skill is not that we want more people to write code on a day-to-day basis. You should think about teaching kids to paint, rather than teaching them to read. It's not because we want more painters or because painting makes you better at the job you do, but painting helps you to see things from a different (artistic) perspective, to appreciate certain joys and certain other techniques.

Sussman has gone on record with a talk titled, "Why Programming is a Good Medium For Expressing Poorly Understood and Sloppily Formulated Ideas." That's probably an everyday use of programming which I've not seen, and it's part of what people learn as one of these "background skills" in college: how to think of things precisely.

I still get a lot of people who are shocked when I teach them relativity. You mean it's not a bunch of mysticism about "mass is squared light energy"? You mean you can prove that this Lorentz transformation doesn't lead to paradoxes? You mean you can derive it with high-school geometry plus some simple axioms that I can clearly understand? The only part which is hard to get across is the causal structure of "light cones", because people don't think in intersecting cones. (I have had some success with calling them "expanding light bubbles," with some reference to supernova explosions.)

Coming back to clarity, and finding it, programming is a good way to pick up that habit, even if you don't code on a day-to-day basis.

There is of course one well-known disadvantage which goes unmentioned in this Coding Horror post: coders are disproportionately more likely to think of legal systems as made of immutable and strict laws. The idea that a judge is supposed to, y'know, judge the human costs of competing legal priorities, and make a decision which is both fair and in keeping with the laws as written -- this discretion seems to be missing. You see this as well with how coders approach pharmacists: it's as if pharmacy was no longer a medical discipline and was somehow relegated to counting pills. No, that's what we code the robots for. Stop equating people with robots.

But if we remain sensitive to the humanity of others, then being able to code probably functions to a net benefit, much like Jeff's example of plumbing does. I mean, there are still occasions where you need a professional, but everyone should have disassembled the pipes to their sink at some point in their life, just for the experience.

> It assumes that coding is the goal.

I don't think anyone is saying that (I hope). Instead we're telling people to learn to code as a means to better understand technology, and then use technology to your favor to improve your life. And when that happens, coding will naturally become more common in your life, even if indirectly (managing others who write code, but this time actually knowing what you're doing). "Coding" is just a more common part of the problem, which has a much deeper meaning. I tell everyone they should learn to code, not because I think they should be writing hundreds or thousands of lines per day like I do. But because they should better understand the world we live in. And learning to code will get you there faster.

Thinking we're telling people they should learn to code just for the sake of coding is completely missing the point. I tell everyone they should learn to code for the exact same reason I tell everyone they should learn science, politics and law. Your life will be better if you're scientifically literate and technologically literate because you'll better understand the world around you.

> can you explain to me how Michael Bloomberg would be better at his day to day job of leading the largest city in the USA if he woke up one morning as a crack Java coder?

That's the wrong question. You should be asking how can be better at his day job if he was technologically literate. And I'm pretty sure anyone here can think of many different awesome ways anyone at all could be better at their job if they knew how to better use technology around them in their favor. Let alone a major of a metropolis.

> so please pardon my skepticism of the sentiment that "everyone can learn to code".

This is a separate problem. I think everyone should learn how to code, how science, politics and law works. For their own sake. Their life will be better if they do. Implying they shouldn't try because they're not good enough is analogous to saying most people shouldn't vote because they're not competent enough to choose the right candidates. The point is, it's in their interest to do so. Now is it in our interest that they do so? And that's a whole separate issue I would really rather not get into.