[joshocar]

I think this is pretty true. I think almost all of the hard science researchers are part software developers. Pretty much every professor I had in mechanical engineering was doing some type of programming or had graduate students/post docs doing it. My masters in oceanography was almost entirely built in Matlab and Python. One of the physics professors was studying black holes and their work revolved around making a cheap super computer with PS4s and running his black holes merger simulations on it.

[meibo]

I think that there's an inherent connection to this - code is an incredible tool that can take scientific research, not just in "traditional" natural sciences, but also in fields like sociology.

It has revolutionized all the other parts of our lives, so it makes sense that an inherent programming skill, if you're working in academic research, would follow.