Yep, you have the "far detached from real work" reaction. Plus, if you consider "you" (or an imaginary candidate you project yourself upon) risk not being able

Yep, you have the "far detached from real work" reaction. Plus, if you consider "you" (or an imaginary candidate you project yourself upon) risk not being able to answer it in 10 minutes because of such the high pressure it would put on you, then it basically means that you did not even try to answer it in your head, or that you were not able to. But this is the moral equivalent of asking a person who pretends to be a mathematician to do a 3 by 3 figures multiplication. It won't show much if they answer correctly (at least demonstrate a correct method to do it, never mind potential mistakes), but you can easily dismiss them if they fail. Now programming is a little bit different, because I admit there can be some positions where people can somehow contribute despite being incapable of lots of basic things. It depends on several factors, though, and even then I'm not sure the end result would ever be very solid. But I understand that in some contexts, such people would not be hired...