I may have not made myself clear; I think it is largely true that programmers start writing COBOL in language x; some rapidly progress, others don't. It's the

I may have not made myself clear; I think it is largely true that programmers start writing COBOL in language x; some rapidly progress, others don't. It's the latter group that are red flags to me — it signals a lack of intellectual curiosity. Again, it's not dispositive or anything; sometimes programmers, particularly younger ones, just haven't seen the strengths of the idiom in their alternate languages.