6 ms·

I think programmers should reframe the problem. If cognitive decline is real, why would anyone hire anybody over 40? Yet there are plenty managers, politicians,

by js8 9y ago

I think programmers should reframe the problem. If cognitive decline is real, why would anyone hire anybody over 40? Yet there are plenty managers, politicians, doctors, lawyers, salespeople, engineers, etc. who are over 40. If you want a culture where people retire at 40, go for it. But please don't pretend that programmers are "special" in that the decline in their skills is worse than decline in skills of anybody else.

throwawaymanbot 9y ago
Yea, I feel the cognitive decline is a kind of an excuse, to mask the expense of experienced programmers. Only in the tech industry is this an issue. No one would complain about a 63yo brain surgeon, who according to some IT HR people would have cognitive decline, but has somehow picked up skills to be a master surgeon.
adrianN 9y ago
Cognitive decline is real but you have to balance it with the increase in experience.
- mmmpop 9y ago
  No chance I can do math in my head nearly as well at 30 as I could at even 25, but I can't count the other areas I have improved in that seem to mean so much more as an adult and as a professional. For example, I couldn't learn other languages so well as a teenager (I wasn't such a great grammarist with English either). As an adult I've picked up French rather quickly and grown fascinated by linguistics; hard to understate the positive effects this has had on my career and even social life. Take all of that and the real-world job experience, add it to the calc and CS coursework from university and I'm 100x the developer I was 5 years ago.
- Thetawaves 9y ago
  And highly variable. I have seen many folks as sharp as a tack well into their 80s, long after they have left the work force...
timwaagh 9y ago
programmers actually need to think sometimes. the jobs mentioned are more routine and rely on soft skills and experience a lot. I do not mean any disrespect by that. mathematicians are also best when they are young, but unlike programmers work in academia and get to teach until retirement, whereas programmers get replaced.
- emodendroket 9y ago
  Doctors don't need to think? Come on, man.
  - timwaagh 9y ago
    they do but it is not the same thing at all. we need to think for hours, finding the right algorithm to compute something. doctors need to make the right decision in very little time based on their experience and knowledge.
    - mmmpop 9y ago
      > finding the right algorithm to compute something Perhaps English is not your first language because you sound like me at 19 explaining to my dad why I haven't finished his website lol
      - timwaagh 9y ago
        What does that have to do with anything?
- yellowapple 9y ago
  I'd hope that my doctor "need[s] to think sometimes". Anything less while holding a scalpel in anticipation of cutting me open is downright terrifying. Same goes, ideally, for politicians and lawyers and engineers.
- js8 9y ago
  > mathematicians are also best when they are young This guy springs to mind: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laszlo_Babai https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laszlo_Babai Because, yeah, programmers and mathematicians don't actually need any experience, they can just think everything up on the spot! I also wonder how you imagine that other professions gain their experience, if they don't need to think.
sotojuan 9y ago
> Yet there are plenty managers, politicians, doctors, lawyers, salespeople, engineers, etc. who are over 40. If anything, these careers (aside from doctor maybe) hit their peak in their 40s or early 50s. I would say our culture thinks programmers peak in their late 20s/early 30s. For HN users in their 30s - what are you doing to not get ageism'd?
- RUG3Y 9y ago
  I'm in my 30's and I'm just barely getting started. I'm actually pretty concerned about my future.
- imhoguy 9y ago
  Launching side-projects for fun and profit when the family sleeps. But it is rather escape cave from daily boring corporate stuff.
mmmpop 9y ago
Hey great career idea for extreme over-achievers: write software until you're 35 but in the meantime study full-time as a thoracic surgeon. By the time you're "done" or "washed up" (according to some recruiter who does...??), you're the right age to start your career as a doctor that I'd probably not want cutting into me for a few more years.
ryandrake 9y ago
The more I think about it, the more I believe this is indeed the fatal flaw in nearly all^ of the arguments against hiring experienced programmers. For any service I can think of where skill is needed, whether it be patching my roof, fixing my car, doing surgery on me, representing me in court, flying the airplane I'm on, I would rather pay more to have a greybeard doing it than have someone fresh out of training/college doing it. I'd guess most people are not even remotely concerned about "cognitive decline" in any of these scenarios. What makes programming different? ^ (all the arguments that don't boil down to "you have to pay them more")
lliamander 9y ago
It's not just about cognitive decline, but about how quickly our knowledge becomes obsolete. Tech is a very fashion-driven industry right now, and deep knowledge is sometimes (often?) valued less than ability to pick up the latest trend. There are skill sets that have a longer shelf-life, but developing those skills (and finding jobs that actually need those skills) is a challenge.
- js8 9y ago
  > but about how quickly our knowledge becomes obsolete I kind of expected that argument to come up. It's funny that the reaction of the industry itself to that is to give up on the experience and ride with the fashion, rather than fight those trends. It's almost as if immaturity is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
- CodeWriter23 9y ago
  I had to abandon the "keep knowledge in my head" paradigm in 1990 or so and shift to the "problem solver" model. This is the skill set with an indeterminate shelf life. Sure it takes time to become fluent in new systems. That's no different than the first system that I learned. I think if one lacks the willingness to stretch and learn the new, whether one is 25 or one is 70, that is when one becomes unsuitable for this line of work.
  - lliamander 9y ago
    > I had to abandon the "keep knowledge in my head" paradigm in 1990 or so and shift to the "problem solver" model. That is what I aspire to. I think I'm doing well in this regard for how far I am into my career, but any advice you have in this regard would be appreciated by me (and others presumably).
CodeWriter23 9y ago
Cognitive decline? What a load of ageist malarkey. At 51, I can still hold complex thoughts in my head and make solutions. And when I slow down, it's because I'm wisely taking time to contemplate the implications of how the thing I'm working on affects the entire stack. I wish the author would have tried to dispel this and another myth associated with age, inflexibility. I'm still learning new things. And sometimes, choosing what I know and am strong and familiar with is a choice to expedite. It has little to do with a lack of willingness to change or learn new stuff. In fact, I'm much more flexible than I was in my 20's. Mostly because time has tempered my arrogant self-righteous self with a healthy dose of humility.

by js8 9y ago

throwawaymanbot 9y ago

Yea, I feel the cognitive decline is a kind of an excuse, to mask the expense of experienced programmers. Only in the tech industry is this an issue. No one would complain about a 63yo brain surgeon, who according to some IT HR people would have cognitive decline, but has somehow picked up skills to be a master surgeon.

adrianN 9y ago

Cognitive decline is real but you have to balance it with the increase in experience.

mmmpop 9y ago
No chance I can do math in my head nearly as well at 30 as I could at even 25, but I can't count the other areas I have improved in that seem to mean so much more as an adult and as a professional. For example, I couldn't learn other languages so well as a teenager (I wasn't such a great grammarist with English either). As an adult I've picked up French rather quickly and grown fascinated by linguistics; hard to understate the positive effects this has had on my career and even social life. Take all of that and the real-world job experience, add it to the calc and CS coursework from university and I'm 100x the developer I was 5 years ago.
Thetawaves 9y ago
And highly variable. I have seen many folks as sharp as a tack well into their 80s, long after they have left the work force...

timwaagh 9y ago

programmers actually need to think sometimes. the jobs mentioned are more routine and rely on soft skills and experience a lot. I do not mean any disrespect by that. mathematicians are also best when they are young, but unlike programmers work in academia and get to teach until retirement, whereas programmers get replaced.

emodendroket 9y ago
Doctors don't need to think? Come on, man.
- timwaagh 9y ago
  they do but it is not the same thing at all. we need to think for hours, finding the right algorithm to compute something. doctors need to make the right decision in very little time based on their experience and knowledge.
  - mmmpop 9y ago
    > finding the right algorithm to compute something Perhaps English is not your first language because you sound like me at 19 explaining to my dad why I haven't finished his website lol
    - timwaagh 9y ago
      What does that have to do with anything?
yellowapple 9y ago
I'd hope that my doctor "need[s] to think sometimes". Anything less while holding a scalpel in anticipation of cutting me open is downright terrifying. Same goes, ideally, for politicians and lawyers and engineers.
js8 9y ago
> mathematicians are also best when they are young This guy springs to mind: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laszlo_Babai https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laszlo_Babai Because, yeah, programmers and mathematicians don't actually need any experience, they can just think everything up on the spot! I also wonder how you imagine that other professions gain their experience, if they don't need to think.

sotojuan 9y ago

> Yet there are plenty managers, politicians, doctors, lawyers, salespeople, engineers, etc. who are over 40. If anything, these careers (aside from doctor maybe) hit their peak in their 40s or early 50s. I would say our culture thinks programmers peak in their late 20s/early 30s. For HN users in their 30s - what are you doing to not get ageism'd?

RUG3Y 9y ago
I'm in my 30's and I'm just barely getting started. I'm actually pretty concerned about my future.
imhoguy 9y ago
Launching side-projects for fun and profit when the family sleeps. But it is rather escape cave from daily boring corporate stuff.

mmmpop 9y ago

Hey great career idea for extreme over-achievers: write software until you're 35 but in the meantime study full-time as a thoracic surgeon. By the time you're "done" or "washed up" (according to some recruiter who does...??), you're the right age to start your career as a doctor that I'd probably not want cutting into me for a few more years.

ryandrake 9y ago

The more I think about it, the more I believe this is indeed the fatal flaw in nearly all^ of the arguments against hiring experienced programmers. For any service I can think of where skill is needed, whether it be patching my roof, fixing my car, doing surgery on me, representing me in court, flying the airplane I'm on, I would rather pay more to have a greybeard doing it than have someone fresh out of training/college doing it. I'd guess most people are not even remotely concerned about "cognitive decline" in any of these scenarios. What makes programming different? ^ (all the arguments that don't boil down to "you have to pay them more")

lliamander 9y ago

It's not just about cognitive decline, but about how quickly our knowledge becomes obsolete. Tech is a very fashion-driven industry right now, and deep knowledge is sometimes (often?) valued less than ability to pick up the latest trend. There are skill sets that have a longer shelf-life, but developing those skills (and finding jobs that actually need those skills) is a challenge.

js8 9y ago
> but about how quickly our knowledge becomes obsolete I kind of expected that argument to come up. It's funny that the reaction of the industry itself to that is to give up on the experience and ride with the fashion, rather than fight those trends. It's almost as if immaturity is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
CodeWriter23 9y ago
I had to abandon the "keep knowledge in my head" paradigm in 1990 or so and shift to the "problem solver" model. This is the skill set with an indeterminate shelf life. Sure it takes time to become fluent in new systems. That's no different than the first system that I learned. I think if one lacks the willingness to stretch and learn the new, whether one is 25 or one is 70, that is when one becomes unsuitable for this line of work.
- lliamander 9y ago
  > I had to abandon the "keep knowledge in my head" paradigm in 1990 or so and shift to the "problem solver" model. That is what I aspire to. I think I'm doing well in this regard for how far I am into my career, but any advice you have in this regard would be appreciated by me (and others presumably).

CodeWriter23 9y ago

Cognitive decline? What a load of ageist malarkey. At 51, I can still hold complex thoughts in my head and make solutions. And when I slow down, it's because I'm wisely taking time to contemplate the implications of how the thing I'm working on affects the entire stack. I wish the author would have tried to dispel this and another myth associated with age, inflexibility. I'm still learning new things. And sometimes, choosing what I know and am strong and familiar with is a choice to expedite. It has little to do with a lack of willingness to change or learn new stuff. In fact, I'm much more flexible than I was in my 20's. Mostly because time has tempered my arrogant self-righteous self with a healthy dose of humility.