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by IshKebab 735 days ago
Yeah my impression is that there are a decent number of people who are probably smart enough to learn to program, at least in an "easy" language like Python, but it's just too boring for the average person.

I think law is similar. Do you really need to be super smart to be a lawyer? Probably not. But you do have to be vaguely interested in reading legal texts and... Jesus no thanks.
1 comments
jayd16 734 days ago
Most people are smart enough to program, I think. The biggest hurdle is being able to sit down and work on a program for 8 hours a day. All the other skills can be learned.
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strken 734 days ago
"Most people" as in "most people jayd16 interacts with", "most people who hold a white-collar job", "most people who hold any job at all", "most working-age adults", or "if you randomly selected a big enough group of people, more than half of them could become professional programmers"?

I suspect we're in a bubble. Consider the charts at the end of https://users.ssc.wisc.edu/~hauser/merit_01_081502_complete...., specifically the "Computer occs." results. I don't think most people are smart enough to become professional programmers if they have to compete with existing professional programmers for jobs. I do think that if you look around the average office which employs programmers, most of the people in non-technical roles could have become a professional programmer, but that's a biased sample.

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jayd16 734 days ago
My conjecture was whether most people have the mental acuity to write a program and I stand by that. I really don't think you need to be especially "smart". I specifically mention that many do not have the capacity to succeed in the office setting we picture when we think of professional programmers.

And I make no mention of professional success especially in the face of a competitive market and no definition of success so I'm not sure where you're pulling any of this from.

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klyrs 734 days ago
I think you're reading past jayd16's point. Just about anybody can figure out how to program x86 assembly, if they put in the effort. Saying this as a mom of a child who very much cannot program. It's one thing to want to be a successful programmer; and another thing entirely to want to program.
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strken 734 days ago
If that's the point, then in the context of bootcamps preparing people to be professional programmers it's a bit...well, pointless. Writing a program of any sort is something anyone who can use a keyboard to write "print(10)" can do, but that doesn't suggest the only thing separating that group from professional programmers is the inclination to spend time on it.
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klyrs 733 days ago
In a past life, I tutored probably hundreds of kids in math and computer science. Yes, the separator is inclination to spend time on it -- because that's what it takes to get through to the other side of a challenge. Programming skill builds with time; they won't be pros but I'll take a risk on a keener from any background.
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strken 727 days ago
Kids who aren't capable of learning to program well aren't going to be inclined to spend time on it, so I'm not sure how this tells us anything.
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