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First page of google for Jonathan Edwards produces a 17th century philosopher and a singer. Adding "Jonathan Edwards programming" produces Subtext, which has a

• nmrm 12y ago
  I'm not claiming he's an Super Well Known Guy, but that it's trivially easy to figure out the non-programmer ad hom is inaccurate. > First page of google for Jonathan Edwards produces a 17th century philosopher and a singer. Because all real programmers are on the first page of Google when you search for their name. It's also worth noting the historical Jonathan Edwards is a pretty important figure in American history. The First Great Awakening set the tone for American religion; it's standard material in any high school History class. And if there's one person you teach about from that period, it's Edwards. In fact, I would be somewhat surprised if most Americans don't recognize the name. So being out-ranked by him isn't exactly unexpected > Adding "Jonathan Edwards programming" produces Subtext Right. So even if you haven't heard the name before, some very simple google searching turns up the fact that he isn't a non-programmer. And even without that, you could flip through his prior blog posts and figure out that non-programmer isn't an accurate description. > yawning about how programming needs to be more academic? I mean, the article says basically the exact opposite of this? > Honestly, I have no idea who he is. Yeah, I don't know who most of the world's programmers are. So they must not be real programmers (well, unless googling their name turns up their github account? But self-hosted projects don't count!). But in 10 seconds of Google you figured out that non-programmer probably isn't a great description. And in a few more you might've figured out he's a fellow at MIT's CSAIL, which isn't particularly well-known for hiring programming-illiterate people. My point was that it's usually a good idea to actually research the author of a piece before firing off the ad homs.