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> I'd argue that people who read 4 or 5 books on programming don't know much about anything either when they first start out. I would say that's a function of

> I'd argue that people who read 4 or 5 books on programming don't know much about anything either when they first start out. I would say that's a function of a lot of complex items, including their prior educational experience, general intelligence, and just how closely they read the book. There exist many books I've "read" once and mostly forgotten, and precious few I've read a half-dozen or more times and know intimately. If the former, I agree with you. If the latter, not so much. > In fact, I'd argue that a graduate knows much more than most people think. In my experience there are two kinds of graduates, those who spent years memorizing material to get a piece of paper, and those who learned how to learn and applied it to get their piece of paper. When folks talk about shit graduates they have the former in mind, when folks extol the virtues of a university education they are thinking of the latter. Unfortunately universities spit out both and it's very hard to distinguish on-the-fly.

WalterBright 7y ago
HN regularly has posts where people justify cheating their way through college. I can't help but think these are the ones who do poorly at their jobs, and then the "years memorizing material to get a piece of paper" gets blamed.
- jshowa3 7y ago
  Or people generally don't distinguish between good graduates and bad ones. In most discussion, the distinction boils down to "college graduates suck and don't know anything" to paraphrase. While granted there's obviously people who don't take college seriously, many do. And unfortunately, I'm one of those people that worked very hard to get through college and didn't attend hardly any social functions. Same as high school. I would spend weekends from 8am to 6pm reading textbooks and doing assignments. However, I often feel that doing this was somewhat of a detriment to both my ability to socialize and my ability to really solve problems organically.

WalterBright 7y ago

HN regularly has posts where people justify cheating their way through college. I can't help but think these are the ones who do poorly at their jobs, and then the "years memorizing material to get a piece of paper" gets blamed.

jshowa3 7y ago
Or people generally don't distinguish between good graduates and bad ones. In most discussion, the distinction boils down to "college graduates suck and don't know anything" to paraphrase. While granted there's obviously people who don't take college seriously, many do. And unfortunately, I'm one of those people that worked very hard to get through college and didn't attend hardly any social functions. Same as high school. I would spend weekends from 8am to 6pm reading textbooks and doing assignments. However, I often feel that doing this was somewhat of a detriment to both my ability to socialize and my ability to really solve problems organically.