11 ms·

Interview by a 15 Year Old

206 points by revorad 11y ago

kercker 11y ago
"I think all kids should learn how to program at some point. I'm not sure what's the right age." I do not think all kids should learn how to program. I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill.
- choxi 11y ago
  I assume PG meant that every kid should learn how to code like every kid should learn how to write, not that every kid should become a professional programmer or writer.
  - kozukumi 11y ago
    Even then I don't really see the point. If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion.
    - weaksauce 11y ago
      perhaps it will shape how they see programming in general. I would rather have a manager that had a reasonable knowledge of how difficult programming is so that reasonable expectations can be made about schedule and budget.
      - kozukumi 11y ago
        You can make that argument about every type of work.
      - amelius 11y ago
        > I would rather have a manager that had a reasonable knowledge of how difficult programming is so that reasonable expectations can be made about schedule and budget. True. But the trouble with programming is that once you have the basic skills, you start thinking that anything is possible. Yet, the real problems start knocking on your door when you want to build large real-life long-lived systems with changing requirements. Take for instance the issue of "technical debt" or "code rot". Someone who has had just a little exposure to programming might say that those issues don't exist (how could code "rot"?), whereas a manager with no programming experience will more easily accept them as part of life.
    - moonchrome 11y ago
      >If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion. I'm willing to bet it will do more good for 90% of them than learning about Chemical Bonds, Hooke's law, solving quadratic equations, enumerating mass movement processes in geography, memorizing historic time periods, reading Dostoevsky/Kafka and whatever other nonsense we were supposed to learn during high-school education that I can guarantee you 90% of my peers (myself included) couldn't answer even at a basic level even if they passed an exam on it at some point with great scores. Almost every office job I can think of can benefit from familiarity with programming concepts - not even knowledge - just a basic familiarity - enough so you can reason trough a simple SQL query or write a non trivial excel formula.
      - sacado2 11y ago
        This. Plus, it has the virtue of teaching you logic and rational thinking, which is something useful in every field of life, not only programing. Plus it makes computers less frightening and magical since you have a bit of understanding of how they work.
      - buckpassing 11y ago
        as I understand you, you think learning a programming language will do more good for 90% of students than being exposed to chemistry, physics, algebra, history, literature, and whatever other nonesense, which I take you to mean other things commonly studied in high school like art, psychology, a foreign language, economics, etc. where, may I ask, did you ever hear about Hooke's law, chemical bonds, quadratics or Kakfa? You're reference to these things, in the hopes they'd support your rather silly claim, shows that a multi-faceted education is a good thing. If you weren't the recipient of such an education, you couldn't prove your point. problem solving, logic, etc can be taught outside of programming. I was taught first order logic through a philosophy course. it seems like you think programming can teach you all the important forms of reasoning.
        11y ago
    - Retra 11y ago
      That is the point: to teach problem solving skills. Programming practice buttresses mental modeling techniques and helps one imagine realistic solutions to technical problems. There is another goal though, and it mimics writing. If only the 'elite' know how to write, then history will be written by the powerful. If everyone knows how to program, this increasingly popular communication medium will be less under the control of a biased few.
    - scrollaway 11y ago
      You don't see the point in teaching kids the fundamentals of how every machine in their life works? Media and politicians right now are abusing the fact that a large amount of the population is tech-illiterate. People can't comment on issues that affect their lives in major, invisible ways because they don't know the implication of, say for example, banning encryption (cf. uk politics currently). This has to change and it starts with education.
      - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
        Learning an ALGOL-like notation doesn't magically make you competent to speak of cryptography. In fact, it almost by definition does not teach you the fundamentals. There's no reason to believe programming classes will be at all useful for anything, other than to impart false knowledge.
    - eropple 11y ago
      How about Excel?
- vdaniuk 11y ago
  >I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. Programming/coding/software engineer is, probably, the only skill that provides high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, a global market and low financial cost of entry. Unless a kid is coming from a rich family, learning programming among other skills is her/his best bet at achieving a decent quality of life. Also, saying that programming is just one of many skills is like saying that communication and persuasion is just one of many skills. Just as "people" skill, programming skill is a powerful multiplier.
  - notahacker 11y ago
    Most white collar professions in the developed world offer high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, global markets and low financial cost of entry without having high-school level programming skill or wealthy parents as a baseline requirement.
    - vdaniuk 11y ago
      Your argument doesn't match my observations of the current job marketplace in developed countries and is in conflict with most predictions of future.
    - eropple 11y ago
      Many (not all, of course) of them do require significantly more up-front investment, though. Not disagreeing with you, but there are complicating factors.
  - staticint 11y ago
    It seems unlikely to me that future generations will be able to benefit from programming understanding and ability the way the programmers of today have. Economic value lies in scarcity, and as we are now pushing for everyone to have those skills, it will not be scarce anymore. The programmers of today have been lucky because the thing they loved to do anyway just happened to explode as an industry in a short period of time, leaving only a small supply of labour ready to fill the ballooning demand. There is no reason to think that will hold for the future. As every good investor will tell you, when everyone starts looking in the same direction, it is time to run the other way. Some suggest that programming is something that only a small group of people can innately do. Others suggest that it is a task that the majority of the population detest. If these are true, then perhaps it will remain a viable career as most cannot or refuse to do what work needs to be done. I'm not sure I agree with either point. Programming tools like Excel are widely used already by the general population, demonstrating that they can program, that they are willing to program in some capacity, and that it doesn't meaningfully improve their economic standing when outside of a very narrow spectrum of programming – specifically what we seem to call software engineering. I, personally, think programming related work will eventually trend towards what we see in entertainment, agriculture, etc. A small group of people will do very well, more will do the work for practically nothing just to do what they love, and everyone else will have no direct opportunity whatsoever, with, at best, passing relevance in what they do end up doing.
- lordnacho 11y ago
  I think it's like learning an instrument. It's a thing you should do so you know it's there and you appreciate it's a very deep (and hopefully interesting) space. If you don't like it, no worries.
- Alex3917 11y ago
  > I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. For a fifteen year old kid these days, if you graduate from college not knowing how to program then pretty much you are going to have a shitty life. You already need to know how to code to get pretty much any decent job -- not just for web developers, but also for marketers, designers, data analysts, biologists, filmmakers, finance, advertising, manufacturing, transportation, etc. You don't have to be a professional developer for your entire career, but if you don't know how to code then even if you want to go into marketing or whatever, pretty much the best job you'll be able to get is just harvesting leads for minimum wage and then entering the data into Excel. Don't want to learn to code? Doesn't fucking matter, that's what society is willing to pay for.
  - dreamdu5t 11y ago
    Hyperbole. Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy, and it's not even the largest employer when it comes to STEM. People in medicine, finance, or small business don't need to code.
    - Alex3917 11y ago
      > Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy Yeah, but they're the fraction that don't suck and aren't going away in ten years. And again, most people with jobs that require knowing how to code aren't actually developers. E.g. it's difficult to get hired as a customer retention marketer without knowing how to code, but most of those folks also aren't coding on a regular basis, if ever. It's just that when you have 500+ people applying for any decent job, the person who thought it wasn't a good use of their time to spend 3 months teaching themselves to code is almost always going to lose out to one of the other folks who did, just on the off chance that those skills actually come in handy or whatever. Is it unfair? Maybe. But that's just how it works. If you were to look at my HN comments from the early days of the site, you'd see that I was pretty much the poster child for saying that learning to code wasn't necessary. And back then I don't think it was, because the tools were so shitty that to be any good at it pretty much meant that you had to forgo being good at anything else, including other skills that were potentially much more valuable like business or marketing or whatever. And it's hard to pinpoint exactly when, but at some point over the past ten years that has definitely changed.
- JoshTriplett 11y ago
  At one time, not everyone automatically agreed that everyone should learn to type, or learn basic computer literacy. Or to look back even further in history, at one point not everyone could read and write. Imagine if we could expect a basic level of programming skill from everyone. Not the ability to write an operating system kernel from scratch; just the ability needed to put together a shell pipeline to get a job done, or a twenty-line script to automate some tedious task. Imagine how much that would change everyday life. How would mass-market applications change if a tiny bit of scripting skill wasn't too much to ask? How would people's behavior change if their first reaction to any kind of tedious task was "I should automate this", and sometimes they actually could? How would public policy (especially on technology) change? We're moving towards a future run heavily by computers; raising the baseline level of understanding seems critical to me, and it doesn't seem like too much to ask.
  - DanBC 11y ago
    > Or to look back even further in history, at one point not everyone could read and write. We still have that, in 1st world countries. (I've used the wikipedia entry for the US, but rates are similar across EU) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States > This government study showed that 21% to 23% of adult Americans were not "able to locate information in text", could not "make low-level inferences using printed materials", and were unable to "integrate easily identifiable pieces of information."
    - mikeash 11y ago
      I wonder, would those people be able to do those things if the information were presented by spoken word? I suspect (and could be way wrong, of course) that this is more about ability to understand stuff in general, and not really related to being able to read and write.
  - larrys 11y ago
    "just the ability needed to put together a shell pipeline to get a job done, or a twenty-line script to automate some tedious task. Imagine how much that would change everyday life." Well unfortunately like learning a foreign language if you don't constantly use those skills they are near worthless. Especially as you get older. And in one way it's quite a bit different than learning a foreign language. There is a great deal of latitude to make mistakes in, say, Spanish. If you don't have it even slightly correct people can still piece together what you are saying. With programming as everyone knows it's got to be near 100% accurate in syntax or it's not going to run and/or give correct results. I agree that being able to do things in the shell is helpful if you are somewhat regularly doing that type of work. I question how useful it is if someone learns that in high school or college and then needs to apply it to do a task years down the road. Edit: In other words it's not like learning how to ride a bike or play tennis.
- deleted 11y ago
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- nether 11y ago
  I don't think programming should crowd out interaction with other kids and with the natural world, per https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10188796 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10188796. Also consider the practice of Waldorf schools, whose students include many Google kids, which discourage computer use until 8th grade: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/technology/at-waldorf-school-in-silicon-valley-technology-can-wait.html http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/technology/at-waldorf-scho...
- jonesb6 11y ago
  Honestly I think you have to take it into the current context. Off the top of my head if I had to give the best method for raising you socioeconomic class in the United States it would start with either "Start your own business", or "learn to program". That said I'm still on the tutoring mailing list for my university's C.S. department, and so many people jump into it and then fall off a cliff. We are forcing an entire generation into field that many will not be successful in. IMO we're pushing a mass of people in a direction with peaks, valleys, and cliffs, without taking responsibility for the numerous negative outcomes that will ensue. "But we need more people in STEM!" "But not everyone wants, or will excel in, STEM!" "..."
  - rustynails 11y ago
    The good thing is that most kids will reject a career path placed on them. My older but young child does not have my love of software development but loves mechanical and electrical design. He 'hates' programming. My other slightly younger child loves writing stories, although he is gifted (as per WISC) with mathematical reasoning (if I recall the term correctly). He has shown a natural understanding of programming, but no interest. I consider his thinking much broader. I love my kids different interests. I think the 'learn programming in school' is highly overrated, unless it's a component of something bigger eg. Logic, technology).
- gaius 11y ago
  I say this every time "learn to code" comes up, kids should learn to cook. People who can cook a meal from basic ingredients are healthier (than they would have been living on ready meals and takeaways), wealthier because it's cheaper, more relaxed because they have a hobby and more attractive to whatever is the gender of their preference. Humans have been cooking for thousands and thousands of years, but modern schools have no idea how to teach it, hence the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, etc. So how on Earth can they teach anyone to "code" and should that reallly be priority? Silicon Valley VCs want everyone to learn to code because it'll be cheap grist for their mill...
  - ageofwant 11y ago
    > Silicon Valley VCs want everyone to learn to code because it'll be cheap grist for their mill... Too right. I've yet to read one of these that acknowledges that.
  - tempestn 11y ago
    I agree with you in general that coding (unlike critical thinking and logic, as discussed above) is not a necessary skill. I think the last sentence is uncharitable though. At least in the case of pg, I'm pretty confident that his desire for everyone to learn to code is purely altruistic, springing from the fact that programming ability was a massive positive factor in his own life, as well as those of most people he knows. More, I expect that most VCs, like most people, are generally decent human beings, and therefore their motives are likely not to be purely self-centered. I'm sure there are some sociopaths out there who only care about building their fortunes, but most who advocate learning to code probably legitimately believe it's a good idea. (And honestly, it IS beneficial to learn to code; just not as vitally important as it is sometimes portrayed.)
  - aianus 11y ago
    You can code for $60/h and pay $5-$10 of that to someone else to cook a meal for you and clean up too. Why on earth would you want to be the latter guy?
    - lentil_soup 11y ago
- davidgerard 11y ago
  I think it's really important that kids learn the concept of programmability: that all of this is just instructions. This is not a widely-known thing! In the UK, all children are now expected to learn coding in school. What this actually means is putting 7-8 year olds in front of Scratch. AND IT WORKS REALLY WELL. Writeup of my daughter's experience: http://reddragdiva.tumblr.com/post/127964136013/it-turns-out-scratch-is-probably-the-answer http://reddragdiva.tumblr.com/post/127964136013/it-turns-out... There's been a zillion simplified languages intended to get kids coding, but Scratch appears to be the one that works. She's one of the academically-bright ones, but I asked her teacher about it and he said the average ones and the academically-bad ones also like Scratch. So it's doing job number 1 right: get the kid actually interested.
SRasch 11y ago
"The combination of forces that produced the default curriculum was so random" This seems true and sad. What would be a first principles approach to "What should every kid learn" if we were to start from scratch you think?
- pcote 11y ago
  If we were to start from scratch? Every kid should learn to be themselves. Let their individual educations naturally sprout forth from that.
  - faster 11y ago
    My daughter responded to "be yourself" with "how can I be myself if I don't know who I am?". Kids are still becoming themselves, so that advice is not actionable. I agree with the rest of your comment. I would say that every kid should be exposed to enough experiences to support their natural human quest to understand themselves. But there are people who don't have much capacity or desire for introspection, so that breaks down quickly. I don't think every kid needs the same things. Which is why the industrial education system fails for most. There is no perfect curriculum, there is no perfect law, etc.
- dominotw 11y ago
  > "What should every kid learn" if we were to start from scratch you think? Depends on socio economic class I would imagine. If you belong to middle class in India for example, you would want you kids to buy into 'the cult of achievement' where achievement is defined by how many people you can prove that you are better than. Because this is only one of the few methods available to Indian middle class to ensure that her child is not going to live a life of destitution. You probably won't care if your child is 'thinking critically'. But I guess it is an interesting question as to what school would mean if you belong to upper class in America where you are free from social morality and hierarchies. I would imagine you want you child to learn how to be passionate about things so they can escape a life of constant boredom.
  - 11y ago
myth_buster 11y ago
Is there anything else that isn’t taught to young students that you wish would be incorporated into the material, or any other thoughts on education? I can't comment on the US education system, but back home I think one of the most important ingredient missing from my school education was _Critical Thinking_ [0]. I happened to stumble upon this field by happenstance and was baffled why this is not integral to our education. I attributed this to the assumption that free thinking and critiquing adults is not what an authority/regime would want. Additionally most teachers/adults don't want to be bombarded by "why"s to which they don't have an answer. But then there is also the Hanlon's razor. [0] Wiki def: intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action
- deleted 11y ago
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- ploxiln 11y ago
  I've never heard of a school (in the US) that didn't claim to teach "critical thinking skills" and "how to learn". Of course most don't, even though they know these platitudes are what they need to publicly espouse. It's a pretty big topic really...
- it_learnses 11y ago
  I agree with this. Instead of focusing so much on sports, arts, math, coding, etc., we should be focusing more on critical thinking skills. Rather now we just encourage everybody to join the rat race by picking whichever field will be most profitable for the next 20 years. It happens to be programming now.
- wj 11y ago
  I remember buying books of logic problems for road trips as a child. Definitely contributed to my ability to think critically. I wonder if they make those anymore. Now I only see books of crosswords (they had those too when I was a child) and Sudoku (that fad was still a decade or two out).
Amorymeltzer 11y ago
I'd like to just say thanks to Paul for doing this, it was probably hugely meaningful to the kid. Ages ago I interviewed Neil deGrasse Tyson for an 8th grade assignment - it is still one of the best moments of my life, and one of the major reasons I am a scientist now. I recently read Judd Apatow's book "Sick in the Head", wherein he interviews comedians, beginning in high school. Looking back, I wish I'd contacted more of my heroes. There's very real meaning that comes from it, even just to humanize people a teenager looks up to. I'd love to see more of this.
- visakanv 11y ago
  Tyson himself cited his experience with Carl Sagan as one of the best moments of HIS life: > At the time deGrasse Tyson was just a 17-year-old kid from the Bronx with dreams of being a scientist, but Sagan had invited him to spend a Saturday with him in Ithaca at Cornell University, after seeing his application to attend University there. > He toured their labs there, and Sagan gave him a book, “The Cosmic Collection” and inscribed it “to a future astronomer”: > DeGrasse Tyson describes how this influenced his entire life: > At the end of the day, he drove me back to the bus station. The snow was falling harder. He wrote his phone number, his home phone number, on a scrap of paper. And he said, “If the bus can’t get through, call me. Spend the night at my home, with my family.” > I already knew I wanted to become a scientist, but that afternoon I learned from Carl the kind of person I wanted to become. He reached out to me and to countless others. Inspiring so many of us to study, teach, and do science. Science is a cooperative enterprise, spanning the generations.
SixSigma 11y ago
> Sometimes to the extent of redefining the playing field so that the obstacle is no longer in the way. And sometimes, as Marcus Aurelius said : The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.
arbabu 11y ago
------ Most people are not suited to it. I'd be surprised if more than 1% of people are. And even for those few, it's a mistake to start too young. If a startup succeeds, it takes over your life in a way that cuts off lots of other opportunities. It's a mistake to do that sort of pruning before you understand what you're losing by it. I wouldn't advise people to try to start startups before about 23. Before that you should be exploring. ------
- GuiA 11y ago
  > "it's a mistake to start too young" > "don't start before 23" Oh Silicon Valley. I've been in tech in the Bay Area for about 5 years now, regularly attending various events and being a part of the community, and most startup founders under 30-35 are ridiculously naive and boring, with very little to show over time. People over 30 with a decade or so of industry and work experience tend to be much more realistic and methodical about what they're doing (I'm 25). PG is very successful and has some interesting things to say, but it's important to keep in mind that taking advice from someone whose vision of startups in the last 10 years came exclusively from manning YCombinator is going to be deeply biased.
  - arbabu 11y ago
    I'm kinda confused. It looked like you are also confirming PG's observation but you ended with a skeptical tone. Anyway this was interesting to me because most people tend to overly support youngster's into entrepreneurship but this looked more realistic and practical.
    - austenallred 11y ago
      > It looked like you are also confirming PG's observation but you ended with a skeptical tone. Both of these things are necessary on HN if you want to maximize the number of upvotes.
      - arbabu 11y ago
        I'm also excited about my first comment with 4 upvotes :P
KristofferJGalt 11y ago
PG, thanks for doing and sharing this. I like your advice on exploring 'hidden interestingness', this may work for teens and adults too.
CM30 11y ago
Probably a silly question, but what is the book that the high school freshman is writing? Just curious what exactly it is. But it's a decent interview regardless.
RKoutnik 11y ago
> I wouldn't advise people to try to start startups before about 23. Before that you should be exploring. Man, I wish he had written this five years ago. I focused far too early and had to spend a lot of time correcting that course. Finally in the thick of exploring and loving it. Yes, there's hints in other essays about this but the hard age limit says that in a way the others don't. I was a incredibly dumb smart student.
- tempestn 11y ago
  I agree that this is really important. I love seeing how popular entrepreneurship as an option is becoming, but it does seem one effect is that one effect is that young people are trying to start businesses before they really know anything about... anything. I'd like to think that I'm still young enough that this is coming more from memory of where I was at in my late teens and early twenties, rather than some kind of indictment of "kids today". It's just so valuable to get some experience before you go trying to start a company. For one thing, I imagine it would be much more difficult to manage people if you had never had any experience from the other side. (A varied set of experience would be ideal.) That's just one example of many though. So, if you think you want to start a company, that's great! Keep that goal in mind and work toward it. The first step would be to learn and experience as much as you can.
evanmarks 11y ago
I was surprised that the presence and importance of teaching the arts in school wasn't mentioned given Paul's background. Aside from the inherent benefit of learning art for art's sake, it requires self-discipline and relentless self critique. No artist thinks they will just be "ok", they want to be the best. I think this type of self-driven pursuit would benefit any young person on their path towards a startup.
marincounty 11y ago
"What makes a good entrepereneur? Are these the type of people you accept into the program?" The entrepreneurs around me are numerious. My neighbor's are very rich. I grew up with wealthy kids. Many are entrepreneurs. They all(95%), or more gave one trait in common, and it's never mentioned in these Q & A's, but we are all in the big world now. That trait; They have a sympathetic/understanding/wealthy parent. The wealthy parent(usually the father) bankrolls the Entrepreneur. See, poor, middle class kids usually get one chance at a risky entrepreneurial endeavor. If they do get funding, it's usually high rate credit cards. If they fail, they don't get a do over card, and it's Hello UPS, or some other barely livable job where you need to commute 1.5 hours. For some reason this is never talked about, and probally for good reason. Yes, there are exceptions. Yes, guys like PG have tried to reverse the formula, but I have seen this combination work so many times, I feel comfortable calling it a law. It makes as much sense as Moores law, in my eyes. Rich dad helps(money, legal, generation of networking, sometimes the idea, the garage, encouragement, family CPA.) out kid=Kid becomes Entrepreneur. If you born into the right family--it's great. To the poor, middle class kids, do well in school. Get a credential in something. Don't fall for this BS about hard work, and a good idea. Give a rich boy a shot at funding your endeavor, but realize you will have to work a lot harder than the rich kid. Don't bust a gasket in the process. Most of the Entrepreneurs leave what I'm telling you out of their orations. It's embarrassing most weren't Horatio Algiers? Most of their wives, wives usually out of their league, don't even know the real story. I've only heard one Entrepreneur tell the absolute truth, and that was George Sorors. But George's first love is writing, and you can't be in denial if you want to be a good writer/journalist. (Didn't edit, so please lay off my typos. I don't usually even come back to a post, so the nit picking goes unheard. I sometimes fear writing a post like this, because they can track an ip. And even if speaking honesly, we all need to play the game--smile, and act like the free money wasen't there. I really wish Google didn't index every word forever. Hopefully, one day, we will have the ability to pick, and choose what is on Google servers. At least, what we wrote?)
- omegaham 11y ago
  This is a really good point, and it's not just because of the bankrolling that the parents do. They also set a good example for financial management, discipline, respect for education, and perspective toward business. My parents are upper-middle-class. They're not rich, but they're wealthy enough that they know what to do with money. If I were thinking about starting a business, I could easily bounce ideas off my dad and get genuinely good advice. And if he couldn't give me the advice I needed, he knows people who would be able to do so. In contrast, someone who grows up poor is working in a vacuum. Whom are you going to ask, your deadbeat dad? His shithead friends? Your mom, who's working two minimum-wage jobs just to put food on the table and keep the lights on? They work their asses off, but they have no idea how to build a business. As a result, it's no surprise that the wealthy tend to come from the middle class. The rich might fall from grace into the middle class, and the middle class will often make a whole bunch of money and become rich, but the poor tend to stay where they are.
roel_v 11y ago
Sorry for being a grumpy grandpa, but I think the first thing we need to learn young people is that 'coding' is not 'programming' (cue discussion on linguistic descriptivism vs prescriptivism in which I'd normally be in the former camp and defend the use of "y'all"...)
vskarine 11y ago
"An entrepreneur is someone who starts their own business. But only a tiny fraction of new businesses are startups." This needs a context: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html Because Paul Graham (and probably Silicon Valley in large) clearly has different definition for a term 'startup' than the rest of the world. (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/start-up http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/start-up)
- narrowrail 11y ago
  >I am really interested for Paul Graham and others to define term 'startup'. Here you go: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html
  - vskarine 11y ago
    thanks, I found that right before you posted reply and already changed my comment before seeing yours :)
graycat 11y ago
Maybe I'd like to say that this is bad, that's awful, a long list of these other things have been left out, and generally call BS. Nope. This time PG wins, and I'd lose. Very nicely done. Succinct. Nice. Elegant. Top stuff. Sure, wish I'd read that in middle school. Only one point left: Where can I apply to go back to, say, the sixth grade and have a do-over?
hkmurakami 11y ago
"But if you teach them arithmetic as a series of secret tricks—for example, that you can add 6 million and 3 million by adding 6 and 3 and then sticking the million back on at the end—it becomes like a game." Looking back, this was what separated the subjects I loved and was great at, and the subjects where I struggled. In the former group, at an early age I saw learning as a game where I could improve continously.
visakanv 11y ago
> Based on my experiences, the best way to teach kids is to show them the hidden interestingness in the things you want them to learn. This is consistent with the ideas behind BetterExplained [1] and Crash Course [2], both excellent learning resources that are really compelling. "Learning is about a permanent shift in viewpoint, an Aha! moment, not memorizing facts that are quickly forgotten." --- [1] http://www.betterexplained.com/ http://www.betterexplained.com/ [2] http://www.youtube.com/crashcourse/ http://www.youtube.com/crashcourse/
steven2012 11y ago
> Why do you think so many people are hesitant to learn to code, when it is such an incredible opportunity? For the same reason people don't learn other skills. Accountants, when they hit partner, hit mid-6 figures in their 40s, but unless you enjoy finance and accounting, it's boring as hell. People on HN might be shocked to find that most of the world finds programming extremely boring. My wife is extremely smart, smarter than me, but she couldn't last a year as a programmer simply because she finds it boring. In college, I was at the cusp of applying to med school, and just before I stopped myself, because I didn't want the life of a doctor. It represented an incredible opportunity, but it just wasn't for me. Instead, I loved to code and am still doing it 20 years later. It's the passion and interest that matter, not the opportunity.
x0ner 11y ago
> "And even for those few, it's a mistake to start too young. If a startup succeeds, it takes over your life in a way that cuts off lots of other opportunities." Curious for more of an explanation here. I am 27. When is too young? As someone who sold their company, I can attest that it takes over your life, but the amount of things I have learned is insane and I wouldn't trade that.

206 points by revorad 11y ago

"I think all kids should learn how to program at some point. I'm not sure what's the right age." I do not think all kids should learn how to program. I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill.

choxi 11y ago
I assume PG meant that every kid should learn how to code like every kid should learn how to write, not that every kid should become a professional programmer or writer.
- kozukumi 11y ago
  Even then I don't really see the point. If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion.
  - weaksauce 11y ago
    perhaps it will shape how they see programming in general. I would rather have a manager that had a reasonable knowledge of how difficult programming is so that reasonable expectations can be made about schedule and budget.
    - kozukumi 11y ago
      You can make that argument about every type of work.
    - amelius 11y ago
      > I would rather have a manager that had a reasonable knowledge of how difficult programming is so that reasonable expectations can be made about schedule and budget. True. But the trouble with programming is that once you have the basic skills, you start thinking that anything is possible. Yet, the real problems start knocking on your door when you want to build large real-life long-lived systems with changing requirements. Take for instance the issue of "technical debt" or "code rot". Someone who has had just a little exposure to programming might say that those issues don't exist (how could code "rot"?), whereas a manager with no programming experience will more easily accept them as part of life.
  - moonchrome 11y ago
    >If you want to teach kids problem solving skills, logic, breaking down a problem, etc. then that makes much more sense as it is applicable in many areas of life but spending an hour a week for several months teaching a kid how to make a little game in Python isn't really going to benefit them at all in the long run in my opinion. I'm willing to bet it will do more good for 90% of them than learning about Chemical Bonds, Hooke's law, solving quadratic equations, enumerating mass movement processes in geography, memorizing historic time periods, reading Dostoevsky/Kafka and whatever other nonsense we were supposed to learn during high-school education that I can guarantee you 90% of my peers (myself included) couldn't answer even at a basic level even if they passed an exam on it at some point with great scores. Almost every office job I can think of can benefit from familiarity with programming concepts - not even knowledge - just a basic familiarity - enough so you can reason trough a simple SQL query or write a non trivial excel formula.
    - sacado2 11y ago
      This. Plus, it has the virtue of teaching you logic and rational thinking, which is something useful in every field of life, not only programing. Plus it makes computers less frightening and magical since you have a bit of understanding of how they work.
    - buckpassing 11y ago
      as I understand you, you think learning a programming language will do more good for 90% of students than being exposed to chemistry, physics, algebra, history, literature, and whatever other nonesense, which I take you to mean other things commonly studied in high school like art, psychology, a foreign language, economics, etc. where, may I ask, did you ever hear about Hooke's law, chemical bonds, quadratics or Kakfa? You're reference to these things, in the hopes they'd support your rather silly claim, shows that a multi-faceted education is a good thing. If you weren't the recipient of such an education, you couldn't prove your point. problem solving, logic, etc can be taught outside of programming. I was taught first order logic through a philosophy course. it seems like you think programming can teach you all the important forms of reasoning.
      - 11y ago
  - Retra 11y ago
    That is the point: to teach problem solving skills. Programming practice buttresses mental modeling techniques and helps one imagine realistic solutions to technical problems. There is another goal though, and it mimics writing. If only the 'elite' know how to write, then history will be written by the powerful. If everyone knows how to program, this increasingly popular communication medium will be less under the control of a biased few.
  - scrollaway 11y ago
    You don't see the point in teaching kids the fundamentals of how every machine in their life works? Media and politicians right now are abusing the fact that a large amount of the population is tech-illiterate. People can't comment on issues that affect their lives in major, invisible ways because they don't know the implication of, say for example, banning encryption (cf. uk politics currently). This has to change and it starts with education.
    - vezzy-fnord 11y ago
      Learning an ALGOL-like notation doesn't magically make you competent to speak of cryptography. In fact, it almost by definition does not teach you the fundamentals. There's no reason to believe programming classes will be at all useful for anything, other than to impart false knowledge.
  - eropple 11y ago
    How about Excel?
vdaniuk 11y ago
>I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. Programming/coding/software engineer is, probably, the only skill that provides high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, a global market and low financial cost of entry. Unless a kid is coming from a rich family, learning programming among other skills is her/his best bet at achieving a decent quality of life. Also, saying that programming is just one of many skills is like saying that communication and persuasion is just one of many skills. Just as "people" skill, programming skill is a powerful multiplier.
- notahacker 11y ago
  Most white collar professions in the developed world offer high income opportunities, freedom to relocate, global markets and low financial cost of entry without having high-school level programming skill or wealthy parents as a baseline requirement.
  - vdaniuk 11y ago
    Your argument doesn't match my observations of the current job marketplace in developed countries and is in conflict with most predictions of future.
  - eropple 11y ago
    Many (not all, of course) of them do require significantly more up-front investment, though. Not disagreeing with you, but there are complicating factors.
- staticint 11y ago
  It seems unlikely to me that future generations will be able to benefit from programming understanding and ability the way the programmers of today have. Economic value lies in scarcity, and as we are now pushing for everyone to have those skills, it will not be scarce anymore. The programmers of today have been lucky because the thing they loved to do anyway just happened to explode as an industry in a short period of time, leaving only a small supply of labour ready to fill the ballooning demand. There is no reason to think that will hold for the future. As every good investor will tell you, when everyone starts looking in the same direction, it is time to run the other way. Some suggest that programming is something that only a small group of people can innately do. Others suggest that it is a task that the majority of the population detest. If these are true, then perhaps it will remain a viable career as most cannot or refuse to do what work needs to be done. I'm not sure I agree with either point. Programming tools like Excel are widely used already by the general population, demonstrating that they can program, that they are willing to program in some capacity, and that it doesn't meaningfully improve their economic standing when outside of a very narrow spectrum of programming – specifically what we seem to call software engineering. I, personally, think programming related work will eventually trend towards what we see in entertainment, agriculture, etc. A small group of people will do very well, more will do the work for practically nothing just to do what they love, and everyone else will have no direct opportunity whatsoever, with, at best, passing relevance in what they do end up doing.
lordnacho 11y ago
I think it's like learning an instrument. It's a thing you should do so you know it's there and you appreciate it's a very deep (and hopefully interesting) space. If you don't like it, no worries.
Alex3917 11y ago
> I think programming is just one of many skills that one can master, not a must-have skill. For a fifteen year old kid these days, if you graduate from college not knowing how to program then pretty much you are going to have a shitty life. You already need to know how to code to get pretty much any decent job -- not just for web developers, but also for marketers, designers, data analysts, biologists, filmmakers, finance, advertising, manufacturing, transportation, etc. You don't have to be a professional developer for your entire career, but if you don't know how to code then even if you want to go into marketing or whatever, pretty much the best job you'll be able to get is just harvesting leads for minimum wage and then entering the data into Excel. Don't want to learn to code? Doesn't fucking matter, that's what society is willing to pay for.
- dreamdu5t 11y ago
  Hyperbole. Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy, and it's not even the largest employer when it comes to STEM. People in medicine, finance, or small business don't need to code.
  - Alex3917 11y ago
    > Programming is a fraction of the jobs in this economy Yeah, but they're the fraction that don't suck and aren't going away in ten years. And again, most people with jobs that require knowing how to code aren't actually developers. E.g. it's difficult to get hired as a customer retention marketer without knowing how to code, but most of those folks also aren't coding on a regular basis, if ever. It's just that when you have 500+ people applying for any decent job, the person who thought it wasn't a good use of their time to spend 3 months teaching themselves to code is almost always going to lose out to one of the other folks who did, just on the off chance that those skills actually come in handy or whatever. Is it unfair? Maybe. But that's just how it works. If you were to look at my HN comments from the early days of the site, you'd see that I was pretty much the poster child for saying that learning to code wasn't necessary. And back then I don't think it was, because the tools were so shitty that to be any good at it pretty much meant that you had to forgo being good at anything else, including other skills that were potentially much more valuable like business or marketing or whatever. And it's hard to pinpoint exactly when, but at some point over the past ten years that has definitely changed.
JoshTriplett 11y ago
At one time, not everyone automatically agreed that everyone should learn to type, or learn basic computer literacy. Or to look back even further in history, at one point not everyone could read and write. Imagine if we could expect a basic level of programming skill from everyone. Not the ability to write an operating system kernel from scratch; just the ability needed to put together a shell pipeline to get a job done, or a twenty-line script to automate some tedious task. Imagine how much that would change everyday life. How would mass-market applications change if a tiny bit of scripting skill wasn't too much to ask? How would people's behavior change if their first reaction to any kind of tedious task was "I should automate this", and sometimes they actually could? How would public policy (especially on technology) change? We're moving towards a future run heavily by computers; raising the baseline level of understanding seems critical to me, and it doesn't seem like too much to ask.
- DanBC 11y ago
  > Or to look back even further in history, at one point not everyone could read and write. We still have that, in 1st world countries. (I've used the wikipedia entry for the US, but rates are similar across EU) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Literacy_in_the_United_States > This government study showed that 21% to 23% of adult Americans were not "able to locate information in text", could not "make low-level inferences using printed materials", and were unable to "integrate easily identifiable pieces of information."
  - mikeash 11y ago
    I wonder, would those people be able to do those things if the information were presented by spoken word? I suspect (and could be way wrong, of course) that this is more about ability to understand stuff in general, and not really related to being able to read and write.
- larrys 11y ago
  "just the ability needed to put together a shell pipeline to get a job done, or a twenty-line script to automate some tedious task. Imagine how much that would change everyday life." Well unfortunately like learning a foreign language if you don't constantly use those skills they are near worthless. Especially as you get older. And in one way it's quite a bit different than learning a foreign language. There is a great deal of latitude to make mistakes in, say, Spanish. If you don't have it even slightly correct people can still piece together what you are saying. With programming as everyone knows it's got to be near 100% accurate in syntax or it's not going to run and/or give correct results. I agree that being able to do things in the shell is helpful if you are somewhat regularly doing that type of work. I question how useful it is if someone learns that in high school or college and then needs to apply it to do a task years down the road. Edit: In other words it's not like learning how to ride a bike or play tennis.
deleted 11y ago
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nether 11y ago
I don't think programming should crowd out interaction with other kids and with the natural world, per https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10188796 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10188796. Also consider the practice of Waldorf schools, whose students include many Google kids, which discourage computer use until 8th grade: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/technology/at-waldorf-school-in-silicon-valley-technology-can-wait.html http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/23/technology/at-waldorf-scho...
jonesb6 11y ago
Honestly I think you have to take it into the current context. Off the top of my head if I had to give the best method for raising you socioeconomic class in the United States it would start with either "Start your own business", or "learn to program". That said I'm still on the tutoring mailing list for my university's C.S. department, and so many people jump into it and then fall off a cliff. We are forcing an entire generation into field that many will not be successful in. IMO we're pushing a mass of people in a direction with peaks, valleys, and cliffs, without taking responsibility for the numerous negative outcomes that will ensue. "But we need more people in STEM!" "But not everyone wants, or will excel in, STEM!" "..."
- rustynails 11y ago
  The good thing is that most kids will reject a career path placed on them. My older but young child does not have my love of software development but loves mechanical and electrical design. He 'hates' programming. My other slightly younger child loves writing stories, although he is gifted (as per WISC) with mathematical reasoning (if I recall the term correctly). He has shown a natural understanding of programming, but no interest. I consider his thinking much broader. I love my kids different interests. I think the 'learn programming in school' is highly overrated, unless it's a component of something bigger eg. Logic, technology).
gaius 11y ago
I say this every time "learn to code" comes up, kids should learn to cook. People who can cook a meal from basic ingredients are healthier (than they would have been living on ready meals and takeaways), wealthier because it's cheaper, more relaxed because they have a hobby and more attractive to whatever is the gender of their preference. Humans have been cooking for thousands and thousands of years, but modern schools have no idea how to teach it, hence the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, etc. So how on Earth can they teach anyone to "code" and should that reallly be priority? Silicon Valley VCs want everyone to learn to code because it'll be cheap grist for their mill...
- ageofwant 11y ago
  > Silicon Valley VCs want everyone to learn to code because it'll be cheap grist for their mill... Too right. I've yet to read one of these that acknowledges that.
- tempestn 11y ago
  I agree with you in general that coding (unlike critical thinking and logic, as discussed above) is not a necessary skill. I think the last sentence is uncharitable though. At least in the case of pg, I'm pretty confident that his desire for everyone to learn to code is purely altruistic, springing from the fact that programming ability was a massive positive factor in his own life, as well as those of most people he knows. More, I expect that most VCs, like most people, are generally decent human beings, and therefore their motives are likely not to be purely self-centered. I'm sure there are some sociopaths out there who only care about building their fortunes, but most who advocate learning to code probably legitimately believe it's a good idea. (And honestly, it IS beneficial to learn to code; just not as vitally important as it is sometimes portrayed.)
- aianus 11y ago
  You can code for $60/h and pay $5-$10 of that to someone else to cook a meal for you and clean up too. Why on earth would you want to be the latter guy?
  - lentil_soup 11y ago
davidgerard 11y ago
I think it's really important that kids learn the concept of programmability: that all of this is just instructions. This is not a widely-known thing! In the UK, all children are now expected to learn coding in school. What this actually means is putting 7-8 year olds in front of Scratch. AND IT WORKS REALLY WELL. Writeup of my daughter's experience: http://reddragdiva.tumblr.com/post/127964136013/it-turns-out-scratch-is-probably-the-answer http://reddragdiva.tumblr.com/post/127964136013/it-turns-out... There's been a zillion simplified languages intended to get kids coding, but Scratch appears to be the one that works. She's one of the academically-bright ones, but I asked her teacher about it and he said the average ones and the academically-bad ones also like Scratch. So it's doing job number 1 right: get the kid actually interested.

SRasch 11y ago

"The combination of forces that produced the default curriculum was so random" This seems true and sad. What would be a first principles approach to "What should every kid learn" if we were to start from scratch you think?

pcote 11y ago
If we were to start from scratch? Every kid should learn to be themselves. Let their individual educations naturally sprout forth from that.
- faster 11y ago
  My daughter responded to "be yourself" with "how can I be myself if I don't know who I am?". Kids are still becoming themselves, so that advice is not actionable. I agree with the rest of your comment. I would say that every kid should be exposed to enough experiences to support their natural human quest to understand themselves. But there are people who don't have much capacity or desire for introspection, so that breaks down quickly. I don't think every kid needs the same things. Which is why the industrial education system fails for most. There is no perfect curriculum, there is no perfect law, etc.
dominotw 11y ago
> "What should every kid learn" if we were to start from scratch you think? Depends on socio economic class I would imagine. If you belong to middle class in India for example, you would want you kids to buy into 'the cult of achievement' where achievement is defined by how many people you can prove that you are better than. Because this is only one of the few methods available to Indian middle class to ensure that her child is not going to live a life of destitution. You probably won't care if your child is 'thinking critically'. But I guess it is an interesting question as to what school would mean if you belong to upper class in America where you are free from social morality and hierarchies. I would imagine you want you child to learn how to be passionate about things so they can escape a life of constant boredom.
- 11y ago

myth_buster 11y ago

Is there anything else that isn’t taught to young students that you wish would be incorporated into the material, or any other thoughts on education? I can't comment on the US education system, but back home I think one of the most important ingredient missing from my school education was _Critical Thinking_ [0]. I happened to stumble upon this field by happenstance and was baffled why this is not integral to our education. I attributed this to the assumption that free thinking and critiquing adults is not what an authority/regime would want. Additionally most teachers/adults don't want to be bombarded by "why"s to which they don't have an answer. But then there is also the Hanlon's razor. [0] Wiki def: intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action

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ploxiln 11y ago
I've never heard of a school (in the US) that didn't claim to teach "critical thinking skills" and "how to learn". Of course most don't, even though they know these platitudes are what they need to publicly espouse. It's a pretty big topic really...
it_learnses 11y ago
I agree with this. Instead of focusing so much on sports, arts, math, coding, etc., we should be focusing more on critical thinking skills. Rather now we just encourage everybody to join the rat race by picking whichever field will be most profitable for the next 20 years. It happens to be programming now.
wj 11y ago
I remember buying books of logic problems for road trips as a child. Definitely contributed to my ability to think critically. I wonder if they make those anymore. Now I only see books of crosswords (they had those too when I was a child) and Sudoku (that fad was still a decade or two out).

Amorymeltzer 11y ago

I'd like to just say thanks to Paul for doing this, it was probably hugely meaningful to the kid. Ages ago I interviewed Neil deGrasse Tyson for an 8th grade assignment - it is still one of the best moments of my life, and one of the major reasons I am a scientist now. I recently read Judd Apatow's book "Sick in the Head", wherein he interviews comedians, beginning in high school. Looking back, I wish I'd contacted more of my heroes. There's very real meaning that comes from it, even just to humanize people a teenager looks up to. I'd love to see more of this.

visakanv 11y ago
Tyson himself cited his experience with Carl Sagan as one of the best moments of HIS life: > At the time deGrasse Tyson was just a 17-year-old kid from the Bronx with dreams of being a scientist, but Sagan had invited him to spend a Saturday with him in Ithaca at Cornell University, after seeing his application to attend University there. > He toured their labs there, and Sagan gave him a book, “The Cosmic Collection” and inscribed it “to a future astronomer”: > DeGrasse Tyson describes how this influenced his entire life: > At the end of the day, he drove me back to the bus station. The snow was falling harder. He wrote his phone number, his home phone number, on a scrap of paper. And he said, “If the bus can’t get through, call me. Spend the night at my home, with my family.” > I already knew I wanted to become a scientist, but that afternoon I learned from Carl the kind of person I wanted to become. He reached out to me and to countless others. Inspiring so many of us to study, teach, and do science. Science is a cooperative enterprise, spanning the generations.

SixSigma 11y ago

> Sometimes to the extent of redefining the playing field so that the obstacle is no longer in the way. And sometimes, as Marcus Aurelius said : The impediment to action advances action. What stands in the way becomes the way.

arbabu 11y ago

------ Most people are not suited to it. I'd be surprised if more than 1% of people are. And even for those few, it's a mistake to start too young. If a startup succeeds, it takes over your life in a way that cuts off lots of other opportunities. It's a mistake to do that sort of pruning before you understand what you're losing by it. I wouldn't advise people to try to start startups before about 23. Before that you should be exploring. ------

GuiA 11y ago
> "it's a mistake to start too young" > "don't start before 23" Oh Silicon Valley. I've been in tech in the Bay Area for about 5 years now, regularly attending various events and being a part of the community, and most startup founders under 30-35 are ridiculously naive and boring, with very little to show over time. People over 30 with a decade or so of industry and work experience tend to be much more realistic and methodical about what they're doing (I'm 25). PG is very successful and has some interesting things to say, but it's important to keep in mind that taking advice from someone whose vision of startups in the last 10 years came exclusively from manning YCombinator is going to be deeply biased.
- arbabu 11y ago
  I'm kinda confused. It looked like you are also confirming PG's observation but you ended with a skeptical tone. Anyway this was interesting to me because most people tend to overly support youngster's into entrepreneurship but this looked more realistic and practical.
  - austenallred 11y ago
    > It looked like you are also confirming PG's observation but you ended with a skeptical tone. Both of these things are necessary on HN if you want to maximize the number of upvotes.
    - arbabu 11y ago
      I'm also excited about my first comment with 4 upvotes :P

KristofferJGalt 11y ago

PG, thanks for doing and sharing this. I like your advice on exploring 'hidden interestingness', this may work for teens and adults too.

CM30 11y ago

Probably a silly question, but what is the book that the high school freshman is writing? Just curious what exactly it is. But it's a decent interview regardless.

RKoutnik 11y ago

> I wouldn't advise people to try to start startups before about 23. Before that you should be exploring. Man, I wish he had written this five years ago. I focused far too early and had to spend a lot of time correcting that course. Finally in the thick of exploring and loving it. Yes, there's hints in other essays about this but the hard age limit says that in a way the others don't. I was a incredibly dumb smart student.

tempestn 11y ago
I agree that this is really important. I love seeing how popular entrepreneurship as an option is becoming, but it does seem one effect is that one effect is that young people are trying to start businesses before they really know anything about... anything. I'd like to think that I'm still young enough that this is coming more from memory of where I was at in my late teens and early twenties, rather than some kind of indictment of "kids today". It's just so valuable to get some experience before you go trying to start a company. For one thing, I imagine it would be much more difficult to manage people if you had never had any experience from the other side. (A varied set of experience would be ideal.) That's just one example of many though. So, if you think you want to start a company, that's great! Keep that goal in mind and work toward it. The first step would be to learn and experience as much as you can.

evanmarks 11y ago

I was surprised that the presence and importance of teaching the arts in school wasn't mentioned given Paul's background. Aside from the inherent benefit of learning art for art's sake, it requires self-discipline and relentless self critique. No artist thinks they will just be "ok", they want to be the best. I think this type of self-driven pursuit would benefit any young person on their path towards a startup.

marincounty 11y ago

"What makes a good entrepereneur? Are these the type of people you accept into the program?" The entrepreneurs around me are numerious. My neighbor's are very rich. I grew up with wealthy kids. Many are entrepreneurs. They all(95%), or more gave one trait in common, and it's never mentioned in these Q & A's, but we are all in the big world now. That trait; They have a sympathetic/understanding/wealthy parent. The wealthy parent(usually the father) bankrolls the Entrepreneur. See, poor, middle class kids usually get one chance at a risky entrepreneurial endeavor. If they do get funding, it's usually high rate credit cards. If they fail, they don't get a do over card, and it's Hello UPS, or some other barely livable job where you need to commute 1.5 hours. For some reason this is never talked about, and probally for good reason. Yes, there are exceptions. Yes, guys like PG have tried to reverse the formula, but I have seen this combination work so many times, I feel comfortable calling it a law. It makes as much sense as Moores law, in my eyes. Rich dad helps(money, legal, generation of networking, sometimes the idea, the garage, encouragement, family CPA.) out kid=Kid becomes Entrepreneur. If you born into the right family--it's great. To the poor, middle class kids, do well in school. Get a credential in something. Don't fall for this BS about hard work, and a good idea. Give a rich boy a shot at funding your endeavor, but realize you will have to work a lot harder than the rich kid. Don't bust a gasket in the process. Most of the Entrepreneurs leave what I'm telling you out of their orations. It's embarrassing most weren't Horatio Algiers? Most of their wives, wives usually out of their league, don't even know the real story. I've only heard one Entrepreneur tell the absolute truth, and that was George Sorors. But George's first love is writing, and you can't be in denial if you want to be a good writer/journalist. (Didn't edit, so please lay off my typos. I don't usually even come back to a post, so the nit picking goes unheard. I sometimes fear writing a post like this, because they can track an ip. And even if speaking honesly, we all need to play the game--smile, and act like the free money wasen't there. I really wish Google didn't index every word forever. Hopefully, one day, we will have the ability to pick, and choose what is on Google servers. At least, what we wrote?)

omegaham 11y ago
This is a really good point, and it's not just because of the bankrolling that the parents do. They also set a good example for financial management, discipline, respect for education, and perspective toward business. My parents are upper-middle-class. They're not rich, but they're wealthy enough that they know what to do with money. If I were thinking about starting a business, I could easily bounce ideas off my dad and get genuinely good advice. And if he couldn't give me the advice I needed, he knows people who would be able to do so. In contrast, someone who grows up poor is working in a vacuum. Whom are you going to ask, your deadbeat dad? His shithead friends? Your mom, who's working two minimum-wage jobs just to put food on the table and keep the lights on? They work their asses off, but they have no idea how to build a business. As a result, it's no surprise that the wealthy tend to come from the middle class. The rich might fall from grace into the middle class, and the middle class will often make a whole bunch of money and become rich, but the poor tend to stay where they are.

roel_v 11y ago

Sorry for being a grumpy grandpa, but I think the first thing we need to learn young people is that 'coding' is not 'programming' (cue discussion on linguistic descriptivism vs prescriptivism in which I'd normally be in the former camp and defend the use of "y'all"...)

vskarine 11y ago

"An entrepreneur is someone who starts their own business. But only a tiny fraction of new businesses are startups." This needs a context: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html Because Paul Graham (and probably Silicon Valley in large) clearly has different definition for a term 'startup' than the rest of the world. (http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/start-up http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/start-up)

narrowrail 11y ago
>I am really interested for Paul Graham and others to define term 'startup'. Here you go: http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html http://www.paulgraham.com/growth.html
- vskarine 11y ago
  thanks, I found that right before you posted reply and already changed my comment before seeing yours :)

graycat 11y ago

Maybe I'd like to say that this is bad, that's awful, a long list of these other things have been left out, and generally call BS. Nope. This time PG wins, and I'd lose. Very nicely done. Succinct. Nice. Elegant. Top stuff. Sure, wish I'd read that in middle school. Only one point left: Where can I apply to go back to, say, the sixth grade and have a do-over?

hkmurakami 11y ago

"But if you teach them arithmetic as a series of secret tricks—for example, that you can add 6 million and 3 million by adding 6 and 3 and then sticking the million back on at the end—it becomes like a game." Looking back, this was what separated the subjects I loved and was great at, and the subjects where I struggled. In the former group, at an early age I saw learning as a game where I could improve continously.

visakanv 11y ago

> Based on my experiences, the best way to teach kids is to show them the hidden interestingness in the things you want them to learn. This is consistent with the ideas behind BetterExplained [1] and Crash Course [2], both excellent learning resources that are really compelling. "Learning is about a permanent shift in viewpoint, an Aha! moment, not memorizing facts that are quickly forgotten." --- [1] http://www.betterexplained.com/ http://www.betterexplained.com/ [2] http://www.youtube.com/crashcourse/ http://www.youtube.com/crashcourse/

steven2012 11y ago

> Why do you think so many people are hesitant to learn to code, when it is such an incredible opportunity? For the same reason people don't learn other skills. Accountants, when they hit partner, hit mid-6 figures in their 40s, but unless you enjoy finance and accounting, it's boring as hell. People on HN might be shocked to find that most of the world finds programming extremely boring. My wife is extremely smart, smarter than me, but she couldn't last a year as a programmer simply because she finds it boring. In college, I was at the cusp of applying to med school, and just before I stopped myself, because I didn't want the life of a doctor. It represented an incredible opportunity, but it just wasn't for me. Instead, I loved to code and am still doing it 20 years later. It's the passion and interest that matter, not the opportunity.

x0ner 11y ago

> "And even for those few, it's a mistake to start too young. If a startup succeeds, it takes over your life in a way that cuts off lots of other opportunities." Curious for more of an explanation here. I am 27. When is too young? As someone who sold their company, I can attest that it takes over your life, but the amount of things I have learned is insane and I wouldn't trade that.