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Comment by thro1111111 | Hacker News Reader

While this sounds rational, I don't think that's how it works in most cases. Those who do the hiring usually prefer covering themselves by hiring someone with a degree rather than having to explain how they hired you because you made millions to someone else in the past. Also while we understand the hacker culture, many only understand "degree > job", they can't comprehend why you don't have a degree if you are so good.

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> While this sounds rational, I don't think that's how it works in most cases. Those who do the hiring usually prefer covering themselves by hiring someone with a degree rather than having to explain how they hired you because you made millions to someone else in the past.

Definitely not my experience. I can count on one hand the number of employers who didn't want to proceed because of a lack of degree.

For data science specifically?

Remember, this question isn't about general CS.

The original comment sounded like general advice not specific to data science. I was thinking about it in the context of general CS/programming. But even in data science specifically, in my experience the focus in hiring is towards actual skills and less towards credentials/qualifications. I recently (few weeks ago) interviewed with a data science company for a data science role as someone with a software engineering background. It was a challenging interview but the subject of my degree never even came up and I got the job.

Data science is absolutely based on degree level. Software engineering, maybe 50% of people care about your degree.

My impression is there is huge demand for data scientists (e.g. friend who is trying to hire someone and can't find anyone). Open Data Science Conference is running right now in Boston, 3600 attendees... it seems likely that if you can demonstrate skill, someone somewhere will hire you.

I'm a data scientist at a research institution and I have no college degree. I'm self-taught and was originally hired as a software engineer on the basis of my projects and work experience.

> Remember, this question isn't about general CS.

What's your perception of data science vs CS, especially with respect to hiring?

Can you please elaborate more on the kind of work you do?

By that, do you mean <=5 of them, or given that your hand has 5 bits, <32 of them?

Given the rotating power of your average radius and ulna, isn't it possible to go all the way to <64 on single hand binary? (whole hand binary)

65 if you include sticking up the middle finger.

Depends a lot on the company. I know many successful programmers without a CS degree, for example.

That's exactly the problem, though: they're, I assume, programmers, not "data scientists". The notion that you can learn to program on your own and have the self-education result in a comparable (or better) effects than attending classes is widely accepted. I don't see the same attitude towards data scientists, which is what I think the OP is asking about.

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