The Arch Overlord has a point but he has chosen to make a stand on an issue that is shades of Grey and not Black or White. At the end of the day abstraction can

The Arch Overlord has a point but he has chosen to make a stand on an issue that is shades of Grey and not Black or White. At the end of the day abstraction can be very useful, even if you don't understand the underlying technology, depending on what problem is trying to be solved. Today it might be useful to do SQL queries and Form handling via OO and tomorrow it might be more useful to go hack some raw HTML. The answer is, almost as always, "it depends". One could take his argument to ridiculous levels and say if you don't fully understand Machine Code and every layer of Abstraction above it, you are doing something wrong. Clearly a ridiculous argument although I have no doubt that if you did understand all these layers you probably could safetly call yourself a good programmer :)