I think OP is looking at this the other way around -- meaning that it is perfectly possible to create a soft-core CPU on an FPGA, which is a great way to unders

I think OP is looking at this the other way around -- meaning that it is perfectly possible to create a soft-core CPU on an FPGA, which is a great way to understand what any processor actually does. I know this, because I started learning and tinkering with this sort of thing a year or so ago, with no prior experience with electronics or hardware design, or a formal comp-sci education. I had decades of programming experience already, but I think I have learned more about the fundamentals of computer science while playing with cheap FPGAs, than I have by just writing code.