4 ms·

Good question. I work with a team where a degree in CS "or equivalent experience" is considered a requirement. The other day someone asked me what Kernel#return

Good question. I work with a team where a degree in CS "or equivalent experience" is considered a requirement. The other day someone asked me what Kernel#returning does in RubyOnRails. "It's the K Combinator" I replied. Do you think they instantly knew what I meant? And would it have helped if they had?

scott_s 18y ago
To be fair, I have two Computer Science degrees, I'm close to my third, and I had to look it up. Most people I work with right now (who have CS PhDs) would probably need to look it up since they do mostly systems and high performance work.
- raganwald 18y ago
  I'm not suggesting anyone ought to know it off the top of their head. The only reason I remembered it is because I am a big fan of Raymond Smullyan's "To Mock a Mockingbird," the best introduction to Combinatoral Logic ever written: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0192801422?ie=UTF8&tag=raganwald001-20 http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0192801422?ie=UTF8&tag=... As a result, I remember it as the Kestrel which he introduces in the same chapter as the Mockingbird, Identity Bird, and Lark. But actually, I really don't expect anyone to remember it. My point was a little sarcastic, I was trying to point out that programming is at least as much about stuff you use regularly or read currently as it is about stuff you learned a few years ago. If you don't use whatever you were taught, you will lose it. And if you learn it another way--I'm sure there are people who use #returning without knowing anything about combinbatoral logic--it might be just as good. Not knowing what a K combinator does is not particularly harmful to being an amazing software developer. I am not denigrating a degree in computer science. I think it is an amazingly excellent way to start a career (be that working for others or yourself) in software development. But, OTOH, after a person has been working for a while, I think it carries less weight than what they have done with themselves since graduating. If a really good degree leads to a really good first job, which leads to a better seond job, and so forth, I am all for the really good degree that started the process.
ambulatorybird 18y ago
Well, I know what K is (as well as S and I), and I don't have a CS degree. Which just goes to show that there are people out there who can acquire systematic theoretical knowledge on their own.

scott_s 18y ago

To be fair, I have two Computer Science degrees, I'm close to my third, and I had to look it up. Most people I work with right now (who have CS PhDs) would probably need to look it up since they do mostly systems and high performance work.

raganwald 18y ago
I'm not suggesting anyone ought to know it off the top of their head. The only reason I remembered it is because I am a big fan of Raymond Smullyan's "To Mock a Mockingbird," the best introduction to Combinatoral Logic ever written: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0192801422?ie=UTF8&tag=raganwald001-20 http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0192801422?ie=UTF8&tag=... As a result, I remember it as the Kestrel which he introduces in the same chapter as the Mockingbird, Identity Bird, and Lark. But actually, I really don't expect anyone to remember it. My point was a little sarcastic, I was trying to point out that programming is at least as much about stuff you use regularly or read currently as it is about stuff you learned a few years ago. If you don't use whatever you were taught, you will lose it. And if you learn it another way--I'm sure there are people who use #returning without knowing anything about combinbatoral logic--it might be just as good. Not knowing what a K combinator does is not particularly harmful to being an amazing software developer. I am not denigrating a degree in computer science. I think it is an amazingly excellent way to start a career (be that working for others or yourself) in software development. But, OTOH, after a person has been working for a while, I think it carries less weight than what they have done with themselves since graduating. If a really good degree leads to a really good first job, which leads to a better seond job, and so forth, I am all for the really good degree that started the process.

ambulatorybird 18y ago

Well, I know what K is (as well as S and I), and I don't have a CS degree. Which just goes to show that there are people out there who can acquire systematic theoretical knowledge on their own.