So, tell me. Have you ever worked with any design patterns?

In my opinion, the author is just taking a basic interview question way to seriously. Granted, it's a silly question to ask somebody who has 15+ years experience.

But consider trying to hire people out of college (for a startup perhaps.) As these people don't generally have oodles of experience, you're left with having to ask them some questions about their basic knowledge instead of their experience.

Sheesh, Norman, just lighten up. ;-)

I consider that to be a perfectly legitimate question. The author of the article might be surprised about how many people will flat out derail when asked such a simple question. Given that he was talking to an HR representative, such low-ball questions are to be expected; they are just screening for train wrecks before the real interview. Yeah, it is kind of a bummer to talk to a non-technical HR person, but is it really that bad? Does the author not realize what the job market is like right now? There were probably hundreds of applicants for the position, and there needs to be some kind of high-pass filter to choose which candidates are valuable enough for the real technical people to spend time interviewing.

FTA: "I was speechless. I was literally unable to find the words to respond [...]".

Here's my suggestion: drop the arrogance, and either answer the question, or respectfully explain that the interview is over because the position is not what you expected.