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Comment by selridge

3 months ago

I think even BASIC and Python don’t get out of “programming”. Nether did SQL. They’re friendlier interfaces to programming but the real barrier is still understanding the model of computation PLUS understanding the quirks of the language (often quite hard to separate for a newbie!). I think professional programmers think that Python or JS is somehow magically more accessible because it’s not something nasty like C++, but that’s not really a widely shared or easily justified opinion.

Also who cares if someone gets going with an LLM and gets stuck? Not like that’s new! GitHub is littered with projects made by real programmers that got stuck well before any real functionality. The advantage of getting stuck with a frontier code agent is you can get unstuck. But again, who cares?! It’s not like folks who could program were really famous for extending grace and knowledge to those who couldn’t, so it’s unlikely some rando getting stuck is something that impacts you.

I don’t know what slop blog stuff you’re talking about. I think you should take some time to read people who have made this stuff work; it’s less magic than you might think, just hard work.

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selridge

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PaulHoule  3 months ago

The basic skill behind programming is thinking systematically. That's different from, say, knowing what exactly IEEE floats are or how to win arguments with the borrow checker in Rust. Languages like Python and BASIC really do enable the non-professional programmer who can do simple things and not have to take classes on data structures and algorithms, compilers and stuff.

People who get stuck fail to realize their goals, waste their time, and will eventually give up on using these tools.

As for slop blog stuff try

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Two_Cultures

  • selridge  3 months ago

    This is the common pitch, right down to recommending CP Snow.

    It’s also horse-apples. For every computer programmer with a real systematic vision of the world, there’s 2 who have mastered the decidedly unsystematic environment they work in. This is because lots of business problems depend on knowing how IEEE floats work and arguing with eg the borrow checker in rust. Perhaps more than depend on systematics. Either way, a lot.

    Even if we accept that real programming is systematic/logical and not about adapting to an environment, it sure as hell doesn’t present itself that way to users! The entire history of computing is serious engineers being frustrated that the machines they work with don’t allow them to speak in a language they consider logical and elegant. Even the example “non-professional” programming languages (or programming languages suitable for non-professional programmers) arose out of intentional design toward user adoption. I’m not saying that made them alike to agents. I’m saying that it’s REAL CLEAR that the coupling between what the user needs to do and the orderly logic of computation is fuzzy at best.