[j2kun]

People who claim they'll never use computer science in their job as a programmer remind me of the people who say they'll never need math after school.

It reminds me of the old xkcd: you can get by without it, but the fun things in life are always optional.

[randomdata]

From my observations, many seem to dismiss anything related to computer science that is not cutting edge research. For instance, I once recall reading a comment downplaying the Linux kernel because it only used simple algorithms that any first year CS student would learn.

And that may be the case, but that attitude places CS on a pedestal that most people feel is out of their reach. As such, when they use CS fundamentals in their day-to-day programming job, they don't really feel like they are using CS. They're just coding.

Similarly, I think people hold similar attitudes about math. Arithmetic isn't math. It is what elementary school students learn. Only mathematicians with chalkboards full of unintelligible symbols dreaming up formulas that the world has never seen before use math in their job.

[EpicEng]

Yeah, but most dev work isn't very interesting.