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Everybody does not need to learn to code.

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Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#61

Post by mistercow »

samatman wrote: post #60
mistercow wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I was taught long division as a child. Didn't like it; who does? Nor do I use it. Really? I mean, I guess I don't like long division; nor do I dislike it. But I like being able to get its results, and I do it all the time in my head. What do you use instead?

Oh, I'm quite incapable of doing long division in my head. Far too ADD. Professionally, I write parallel OpenCL software used by the mathematics, physics and chemical engineering communities. The irony is not lost on me. EDIT: When I need to approximate long division, I multiply up from the divisor towards the dividend. I find this dramatically easier. My mother is incapable of subtracting in the normal sense, and do…

I'm guessing that's ADD, predominantly hyperactive-impulsive type. I'm predominantly inattentive, which is actually probably why I spend so much time doing mental arithmetic instead of paying attention to what's going on around me.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#62

Post by jjtheblunt »

The title is crap English, but common: ignorance of De Morgan's laws means the universal quantifier "everybody", in its position relative to "not", means no one should learn to code. (Engineer with a Germanic Linguistics minor pet peeve.)

The proper wording for what the retarded author intended (it's Slate, after all) is "Perhaps not everybody needs to learn to code" or similar, but the not needs to negate the universal quantification. Because negation is not commutative with quantifiers, what the title says is not the same.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#63

Post by kyllo »

I would say that not everyone needs to learn to develop software. Software development is a sufficiently difficult and complex job, that is best left to trained experts who do it full-time.

But everyone should learn how to use their computer effectively. Everyone would be better off if they were a "power user." And in the current state of computing, the complexity of computer architecture is not yet sufficiently encapsulated as to render it unnecessary to attain basic competency in some programming language in order to achieve that.

In other words, in order to leverage your computer's full power, you need to learn some scripting language and be comfortable operating your computer from a shell (be it bash, cmd, powershell, whatever).

Most people don't seem to have a clue how many degrees of computer literacy there are. The assumption seems to be, that you are either "computer illiterate" (which means you are an old person who hunts-and-pecks at the keyboard, double-clicks everything, and can at most use "the Googles" to do a search), or you're a "normal person" who can touch type and operate a GUI and maybe do basic formulas in MS Excel, or you're a "geek" who can read and write any type of programming code, build me a website, fix my internet connection, disassemble and repair my computer hardware, etc etc and you probably slid out of the womb knowing how to do that stuff. Yet somehow, you are still only making a modest hourly wage working at the Genius Bar or the Geek Squad.

Where most people really should be is somewhere in between the "normal person," GUI-only level, and the imaginary super-geek, computer whiz level.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#64

Post by samatman »

kamjam wrote: post #58
mistercow wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I was taught long division as a child. Didn't like it; who does? Nor do I use it. Really? I mean, I guess I don't like long division; nor do I dislike it. But I like being able to get its results, and I do it all the time in my head. What do you use instead?

A calculator. Or more likely, the calculator app on his iPhone. Personally, I like the ability to at least be able to get a rough approximation of an answer without having to resort to tech... but hey, call me old fashioned.

I had a very old-fashioned mathematics education. If I was good at doing math in my head, I'd be a professor. Instead, I had to learn to pick problems apart, or I couldn't do them. I'm also bad at remembering the precise steps involved, so when I found out you could write a problem once and then stop thinking about it, well, I never looked back.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#65

Post by mistercow »

kamjam wrote: post #58
mistercow wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>I was taught long division as a child. Didn't like it; who does? Nor do I use it. Really? I mean, I guess I don't like long division; nor do I dislike it. But I like being able to get its results, and I do it all the time in my head. What do you use instead?

A calculator. Or more likely, the calculator app on his iPhone. Personally, I like the ability to at least be able to get a rough approximation of an answer without having to resort to tech... but hey, call me old fashioned.

>A calculator. Or more likely, the calculator app on his iPhone.

That sounds so inconvenient. Sometimes I like to design programs or solve problems in my head when I'm in the swimming pool. I don't think they'd let me bring a calculator or phone in there.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#66

Post by samatman »

mistercow wrote: post #61
samatman wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh, I'm quite incapable of doing long division in my head. Far too ADD. Professionally, I write parallel OpenCL software used by the mathematics, physics and chemical engineering communities. The irony is not lost on me. EDIT: When I need to approximate long division, I multiply up from the divisor towards the dividend. I find this dramatically easier. My mother is incapable of subtracting in the normal sense, and do…

I'm guessing that's ADD, predominantly hyperactive-impulsive type. I'm predominantly inattentive, which is actually probably why I spend so much time doing mental arithmetic instead of paying attention to what's going on around me.

Correct!

Most of my clock cycles, when I'm thinking, are playing a complex and ever changing set of arpeggiated notes. While I suspect that this is my linguistic ability functioning in some kind of overdrive, I have no particular insight into the exact process.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#67

Post by jmilloy »

The logical fallacy here is arguing a general statement using a specific/narrow instances of it: "learn to code" is a very broad statement, and the differing opinions seem to stem from choosing (different) specific meanings.

When someone says "everyone needs to learn to code", they probably don't mean that everyone needs to become an expert. It's the same when we say "everyone needs to learn math" or "everyone needs to learn how to write."

On the other hand, when people say that "no, everyone does not need to learn to code", they tend to compare learning to code with software development, graduate level physics, etc.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#68

Post by freyr »

throwit1979 wrote: post #26
freyr wrote: post #10

Every student should have, at least, exposure to coding and the opportunity to learn it. This has not been the case in my lifetime. In middle school, a special instructor was brought in to teach programming to the GATE kids. She decided she could only handle one student. So out of the entire class, only one kid was exposed to programming in school When it was time to enter high school, there were two public schools i…

Sorry, I don't intend to cast aspersions on your upbringing, but why does class availability matter at all to this discussion? Myself, and everyone in the small group of middle school kids at my school who were interested, learned programming from books. Our school was extraordinarily poor, so the whole notion of CS classes was laughable.

> why does class availability matter at all to this discussion?

It matters because that's exactly what this discussion is about: making coding/programming part of our educational system.

It's about teaching kids programming in schools, and providing them with the same time, resources, and instruction they get to learn cursive or algebra or home economics or English.

Of course, we could always get rid of those subjects too, and expect the kids who are interested to learn them from books in their free time.

Also, not to cast aspersions on your upbringing, but how were you introduced to programming? Did you have a computer in the house or at a friend's house? Or did you just imagine sitting at a computer, and imagine typing commands into a computer, and imagine the results? Perhaps home computers are commonplace now, but it wasn't always the case. And it's not always the case in poor households. Is it likely that children from poor families and attending poor schools would have the same exposure to programming that you enjoyed?

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#69

Post by kolinko »

jusben1369 wrote: post #34

Let me ask, earnestly, why is learning to code better or more important than: - Studying medicine at school so you can avoid engaging with the expensive medical system for all but the most critical issues? - Studying law so that you understand how to read contracts and understand legislation? Mathematics and language are the building blocks of programming. We study those. Going further upstream into the outputs of th…

Basic medicine (how the body operates) and basic law (how the government operates) is usually taught in elementary school.

Basic computer understanding is not, or at least is being taught extremely poorly. Children don't need to learn the intricacies of Word. What they should be taught is how to code (so they understand basics of computers/filesystems/text editors) & use Google (so they know how to find more information) - everything else they can teach themselves.

Re: Everybody does not need to learn to code.

#70

Post by freyr »

talmand wrote: post #27
freyr wrote: post #10

Every student should have, at least, exposure to coding and the opportunity to learn it. This has not been the case in my lifetime. In middle school, a special instructor was brought in to teach programming to the GATE kids. She decided she could only handle one student. So out of the entire class, only one kid was exposed to programming in school When it was time to enter high school, there were two public schools i…

My experience was that by the time I found someone that actually taught something "computer", I already knew more than they did. This was the rule until I was about halfway through college.

I had the same experience. While that's undoubtedly a credit to our tremendous intellects, it also supports the idea that education in "computers" needs to be rethought.

We've been teaching kids math, writing, reading, etc., for centuries (and we still struggle with it). But coding is relatively new, and our educational system doesn't know what the hell it's doing.

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