[llasram]

I think this is a good example of the problems with autodidactism. For all its flaws, structured education is what makes common knowledge common. When you study on your own, you don't know what you don't know, and there's no one there to point out your obvious-with-the-right-knowledge lapses.

[brudgers]

To me it's an example of what Hacker News offers people interested in learning [the human, not machine type]. This very article shows how it is a place where there are no long term consequences equivalent to grades: just a wee bit of standard internet asshattery and those complaints about the youth of today that have been in the Western cannon since Socrates was drinking Hemlock.