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Comment by s986s | Hacker News Reader

I would argue some important concepts to understand are.

- programming is commanding a machine to do what they want.

- computers speak a non-english language so everything they write is translated before the machine follows it

- a machine is only limited to its hardware. You cannot save without a harddrive, you cannot communicate without an antenna of somesort.

Instructing a machine can come in a variety of forms

- Robotics - commands reinterpreted into physical movement

- User Experience - commands reinterpreted to produce graphics or sound

- Logical - Encoding and decoding, list management and prediction, mapping commands to actions, language grammer

If anyone disagrees or has more to add, let me know

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I observe that programmers must be understood: If they can program, they can make the computer do what they want, at least some of the time.

If they are good at programming, they will do this quickly, and in a way that the computer does not have to do any (or many) unnecessary steps.

However I also observe a programmer must understand: If they can program, they can understand the computer, at least in some circumstances and at some level.

If they are good at programming, they will also be good at understanding others.

I believe mathematics teaches people to understand by helping them recognise when they do not yet understand.

To know when you have convinced someone, and yourself have been convinced, is clearly not exclusive to mathematics: Writers, artists, lawyers and lobbyists, all specifically develop these two kinds of understanding, and it is this line of thinking I am currently exploring.

I appreciate this sentiment. Correct me if Im wrong but you are implying, if an individual understands how to command something or do a task, they have a realization of how the bigger picture works to some extent. I agree with this from a personal perspective. Are you interviewing individuals/doing this scientifically or is this a personal theory you test when given the opportunity?

> Correct me if Im wrong but you are implying, if an individual understands how to command something or do a task, they have a realization of how the bigger picture works to some extent.

No: I am not trying to say someone knows how to program if they can program.

In fact, I suspect strongly the opposite: Most people who can program do not have any idea how they program, let alone how to program.

I am saying there are at least two essential skills which are "programming", and not just the one you brought up.

There are more: One must also have a command of the grammar and syntax, but I find that despite how much time people spend on it, this speaks more about how complex languages are, than it does about programming[1], and so I did not bring it up.

[1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9122299

> Are you interviewing individuals/doing this scientifically or is this a personal theory you test when given the opportunity?

I'm a professional and not an academic, and yet a big part of my role is to grow programmers, so it's a little more than a personal theory, but a lot less than a study.

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