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To illustrate how ridiculous and self serving this is, replace the word "data" with "cancer." You cannot become a "scientst" by watching ted videos. At a minim

To illustrate how ridiculous and self serving this is, replace the word "data" with "cancer." You cannot become a "scientst" by watching ted videos. At a minimum, it requires a credentialed degree. Otherwise, I'm a data scientist too.

tma-1 10y ago
Do you need a degree to become a computer scientist / programmer?
- no_wizard 10y ago
  I will position this first before I go on: I think in theory, you can learn almost anything on your own, I'm now going to talk about the reality that I feel is true for most people and things based on my observations and observations I have seen, heard, and/or read about online. I would argue not programmer, but perhaps computer scientist. They are fundamentally different things to me. Programming, and its human facilitator, the programmer, can certainly be learned without a degree. I can teach myself to program fairly well in say, Python, in a few months. What I can't teach easily, in my opinion or rather what can't be taught easily without some uni resources (going to college, maybe not, but to be honest i think the learning format has some advantages here), is say how to proof formal methods, Computational geometry, higher levels of information theory. Quantum Computing. all realms of computer science. Yes, lots and lots of CS depts teach you how to program in languages, but the ones I find that don't burn out in the long term aren't merely programmings, but have a strong understanding of the discrete mathematics that make up a lot of our modern systems. I could go on, but I feel like its going to go into rant like an old grump territory. I do have a bone to pick with this particular article as well: "I will write separate articles on Data Science Books (I’ve read 127 of those in last six months)" Unless those books are 20 pages long, you have not read them. Skimmed maybe, but completely read and logically understand the implications of those books? I have to call foul on this.
- brogrammernot 10y ago
  Hotly debated subject these days. I personally learned programming on my own, and after about two years of doing it, I went back and started taking some computer science courses in data structures, discrete mathematics, algorithms as well as some other topics. I took some coursework through the University I got my undergrad from but most through local community colleges because they were 1/10th of the cost. In my experience, I do not think you need a degree to be a programmer. You need to have extreme grit and motivation to learn it on your own. I took the coursework after doing it because trying to learn advanced computer science topics on top of work in my own time simply wasn't working. It's not incredibly fun to learn, dissect and implement algorithms. At least for me it wasn't. Having no one to ask about advanced mathematics also sucked honestly. For those reasons, a quality education or professor is worth their weight in gold.
  - battlebot 10y ago
    As someone who came up through universities with the full traditional CS background, and as someone who has hired and been a tech lead over many developers, I can count only one person I know who didn't get a degree who is a great developer. The people with degrees all had to learn a lot after school, as did I, but the one who is self-taught is some kind of savant, I kid you not. And as great a developer as he is, he had some holes in his knowledge that I ran across from time to time.
Nomentatus 10y ago
In the old days (a millenia ago) Universities (teacher's guilds, literally) didn't test students - the Church tested the students and credentialed them, not the teachers. The great advantage of this was that there was no grade inflation or other funny business, 'cause there was no conflict of interest. Now, the academy grades its own work, in effect. Back then, if you could get the study in on your own and pass, great. If not, you found a professor and settled on a fee. Now, the academy is an old boys' club, and can get very inbred, and be a decade behind the market, too. In computer science, if someone's a prof at most Universities, it's often a sign they aren't competent enough to survive in the wild.
- tjl 10y ago
  I know many profs who decided to switch from industry to academia because they had enough money and wanted a less hectic lifestyle. A very large number of professors actually do contract work for companies. Even a former Master's supervisor of mine (who is officially retired) still does consulting with companies (typically game developers as he specializes in splines in computer graphics). I'm actually in Engineering and at least in Canada, there's actually an accreditation body that reviews the engineering programs to ensure they live up to a standard. If the program meets that standard, the graduates only have to take a law and ethics exam (in addition to the experience requirement). If you're outside that system, you have to take a series of exams on the material. I know that it's different in the US, though. I believe that you do have to take a set of exams on the core material for your type of engineering as there's too many programs to properly vet all of them.
  - Nomentatus 10y ago
    Certainly (many) tests being taken out of the hands of individual profs and individual Universities is a good thing, so that's heartening - but in fast-moving fields I admit it could mean the test lag knowledge and best practice a bit more. As for excellent peeps choosing to be profs for the lifestyle: for a long while I've been saying that engineers/coders not be exempted from overtime; your response suggests that the unintended effect of that might be to harm teaching quite a bit, if those profs go back to a friendlier industry.

tma-1 10y ago

Do you need a degree to become a computer scientist / programmer?

no_wizard 10y ago
I will position this first before I go on: I think in theory, you can learn almost anything on your own, I'm now going to talk about the reality that I feel is true for most people and things based on my observations and observations I have seen, heard, and/or read about online. I would argue not programmer, but perhaps computer scientist. They are fundamentally different things to me. Programming, and its human facilitator, the programmer, can certainly be learned without a degree. I can teach myself to program fairly well in say, Python, in a few months. What I can't teach easily, in my opinion or rather what can't be taught easily without some uni resources (going to college, maybe not, but to be honest i think the learning format has some advantages here), is say how to proof formal methods, Computational geometry, higher levels of information theory. Quantum Computing. all realms of computer science. Yes, lots and lots of CS depts teach you how to program in languages, but the ones I find that don't burn out in the long term aren't merely programmings, but have a strong understanding of the discrete mathematics that make up a lot of our modern systems. I could go on, but I feel like its going to go into rant like an old grump territory. I do have a bone to pick with this particular article as well: "I will write separate articles on Data Science Books (I’ve read 127 of those in last six months)" Unless those books are 20 pages long, you have not read them. Skimmed maybe, but completely read and logically understand the implications of those books? I have to call foul on this.
brogrammernot 10y ago
Hotly debated subject these days. I personally learned programming on my own, and after about two years of doing it, I went back and started taking some computer science courses in data structures, discrete mathematics, algorithms as well as some other topics. I took some coursework through the University I got my undergrad from but most through local community colleges because they were 1/10th of the cost. In my experience, I do not think you need a degree to be a programmer. You need to have extreme grit and motivation to learn it on your own. I took the coursework after doing it because trying to learn advanced computer science topics on top of work in my own time simply wasn't working. It's not incredibly fun to learn, dissect and implement algorithms. At least for me it wasn't. Having no one to ask about advanced mathematics also sucked honestly. For those reasons, a quality education or professor is worth their weight in gold.
- battlebot 10y ago
  As someone who came up through universities with the full traditional CS background, and as someone who has hired and been a tech lead over many developers, I can count only one person I know who didn't get a degree who is a great developer. The people with degrees all had to learn a lot after school, as did I, but the one who is self-taught is some kind of savant, I kid you not. And as great a developer as he is, he had some holes in his knowledge that I ran across from time to time.

Nomentatus 10y ago

In the old days (a millenia ago) Universities (teacher's guilds, literally) didn't test students - the Church tested the students and credentialed them, not the teachers. The great advantage of this was that there was no grade inflation or other funny business, 'cause there was no conflict of interest. Now, the academy grades its own work, in effect. Back then, if you could get the study in on your own and pass, great. If not, you found a professor and settled on a fee. Now, the academy is an old boys' club, and can get very inbred, and be a decade behind the market, too. In computer science, if someone's a prof at most Universities, it's often a sign they aren't competent enough to survive in the wild.

tjl 10y ago
I know many profs who decided to switch from industry to academia because they had enough money and wanted a less hectic lifestyle. A very large number of professors actually do contract work for companies. Even a former Master's supervisor of mine (who is officially retired) still does consulting with companies (typically game developers as he specializes in splines in computer graphics). I'm actually in Engineering and at least in Canada, there's actually an accreditation body that reviews the engineering programs to ensure they live up to a standard. If the program meets that standard, the graduates only have to take a law and ethics exam (in addition to the experience requirement). If you're outside that system, you have to take a series of exams on the material. I know that it's different in the US, though. I believe that you do have to take a set of exams on the core material for your type of engineering as there's too many programs to properly vet all of them.
- Nomentatus 10y ago
  Certainly (many) tests being taken out of the hands of individual profs and individual Universities is a good thing, so that's heartening - but in fast-moving fields I admit it could mean the test lag knowledge and best practice a bit more. As for excellent peeps choosing to be profs for the lifestyle: for a long while I've been saying that engineers/coders not be exempted from overtime; your response suggests that the unintended effect of that might be to harm teaching quite a bit, if those profs go back to a friendlier industry.