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"Combined with the terrible quality of candidates I've had apply, '>80% can't code' is probably valid over a random sample." The average applicant can't code,

by timr 13y ago

"Combined with the terrible quality of candidates I've had apply, '>80% can't code' is probably valid over a random sample." The average applicant can't code, but that's true across the board. Yet there's a strong and systematic bias against people specifically with doctoral degrees. There's something else going on, and IMO, it isn't explained by chance. "I'm not shocked at the idea there are a lot of people who are great at academic research but terrible production coders." Why? Isn't this just a gentle way of saying that you have a bias? There's no fundamental reason that you should expect that a PhD (especially in CS) would be less able to write code than any other randomly selected applicant. More likely is that most interviewers don't have any idea what goes on inside a PhD program, and bring some very weird, negative ideas to the interview room about what the degree implies.

IanCal 13y ago
> The average applicant can't code, but that's true across the board. That's exactly what I said, and was the point I was making. Combine this with confirmation bias and you're likely to see the result we do. > Why? Isn't this just a gentle way of saying that you have a bias? Academic research and production code have different, conflicting, requirements. That there are people good at one rather than the other is not surprising. I know people who are fantastic researchers, but their code should never go into a production system. I know people who write beautiful code, but they'd never have something good enough for academia. > There's no fundamental reason that you should expect that a PhD (especially in CS) would be less able to write code than any other randomly selected applicant. A PhD versus a coder straight out of university, or a PhD versus someone who has 3 years experience writing production code?
- timr 13y ago
  "Academic research and production code have different, conflicting, requirements." Have you ever actually produced any academic research code? Because my direct experience with the matter says that you're wrong. I've seen plenty of "academic projects" that had far wider distribution, bigger teams and more complexity than your average "production code" (most of which is never used by anyone). "I know people who are fantastic researchers, but their code should never go into a production system. I know people who write beautiful code, but they'd never have something good enough for academia." I know a great many people in industry who micro-optimize for beauty and who go off on architecture astronautic expeditions with no provocation, so what's your point? Are you generalizing to all academics? I can tell you for a fact that "academics" as a group don't care more or less about beautiful code than anyone else, and that research is just another kind of production system. You pretty clearly have a bias that "academia" is this ivory tower place where nobody gets anything done, and that's a stereotype, not reality.
  - IanCal 13y ago
    You seem to think I'm attacking all academics, I'm not. I've repeatedly said that people on both sides write bad code. > Have you ever actually produced any academic research code? Yes. I've also maintained other peoples academic research code. > I've seen plenty of "academic projects" that had far wider distribution, bigger teams and more complexity than your average "production code" (most of which is never used by anyone). And there are plenty of industrial projects with wider distribution and with bigger teams than a lot of academic projects. > I know a great many people in industry who micro-optimize for beauty and who go off on architecture astronautic expeditions with no provocation, so what's your point? There are bad people on both sides, and that being good at one side does not necessarily mean you're good at the other. I thought that was clear in my previous replies, but maybe not clear enough. > You pretty clearly have a bias that "academia" is this ivory tower place where nobody gets anything done, and that's a stereotype, not reality. Please quote me where I've said anything like that. Your first reply to me was taking something I said and repeating my point back at me, to be honest it's just getting a bit tiring. So here's a change, I'm going to ask you this: Do you think that there are some people who are good researchers but bad coders?

by timr 13y ago

IanCal 13y ago

> The average applicant can't code, but that's true across the board. That's exactly what I said, and was the point I was making. Combine this with confirmation bias and you're likely to see the result we do. > Why? Isn't this just a gentle way of saying that you have a bias? Academic research and production code have different, conflicting, requirements. That there are people good at one rather than the other is not surprising. I know people who are fantastic researchers, but their code should never go into a production system. I know people who write beautiful code, but they'd never have something good enough for academia. > There's no fundamental reason that you should expect that a PhD (especially in CS) would be less able to write code than any other randomly selected applicant. A PhD versus a coder straight out of university, or a PhD versus someone who has 3 years experience writing production code?

timr 13y ago
"Academic research and production code have different, conflicting, requirements." Have you ever actually produced any academic research code? Because my direct experience with the matter says that you're wrong. I've seen plenty of "academic projects" that had far wider distribution, bigger teams and more complexity than your average "production code" (most of which is never used by anyone). "I know people who are fantastic researchers, but their code should never go into a production system. I know people who write beautiful code, but they'd never have something good enough for academia." I know a great many people in industry who micro-optimize for beauty and who go off on architecture astronautic expeditions with no provocation, so what's your point? Are you generalizing to all academics? I can tell you for a fact that "academics" as a group don't care more or less about beautiful code than anyone else, and that research is just another kind of production system. You pretty clearly have a bias that "academia" is this ivory tower place where nobody gets anything done, and that's a stereotype, not reality.
- IanCal 13y ago
  You seem to think I'm attacking all academics, I'm not. I've repeatedly said that people on both sides write bad code. > Have you ever actually produced any academic research code? Yes. I've also maintained other peoples academic research code. > I've seen plenty of "academic projects" that had far wider distribution, bigger teams and more complexity than your average "production code" (most of which is never used by anyone). And there are plenty of industrial projects with wider distribution and with bigger teams than a lot of academic projects. > I know a great many people in industry who micro-optimize for beauty and who go off on architecture astronautic expeditions with no provocation, so what's your point? There are bad people on both sides, and that being good at one side does not necessarily mean you're good at the other. I thought that was clear in my previous replies, but maybe not clear enough. > You pretty clearly have a bias that "academia" is this ivory tower place where nobody gets anything done, and that's a stereotype, not reality. Please quote me where I've said anything like that. Your first reply to me was taking something I said and repeating my point back at me, to be honest it's just getting a bit tiring. So here's a change, I'm going to ask you this: Do you think that there are some people who are good researchers but bad coders?