> "So your distinction is that hackers gravitate towards extensions of turing completeness (i.e. code representations) as opposed to mechanical systems like bas

> "So your distinction is that hackers gravitate towards extensions of turing completeness (i.e. code representations) as opposed to mechanical systems like basic engines and or machines?" Oh I didn't mean that at all, they could like engines too or even more, just they aren't turing complete (unless you mean like babbage machines or that crab gate machine which I assume most children wouldn't create or have access to). I meant that usually these proto-hackers as children at some point will have accidentally found a turing-complete thing and played with it when they were children before they learned programming officially, even if they like other things more. Then the moment "the first step from being a tinkerer to being a skilled craftman" would come when they learn that programming is a thing and they find it's actually so much easier than the convoluted logic systems they were making themselves.