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Comment by jbob2000 | Hacker News Reader

jbob2000

What about culture? Computer programming languages and paradigms have all been developed under western culture; they're written in english with logic that is derived from western philosophy.

Without being fully absorbed in this culture, you will lack the key thing that makes you go "ah ha! I get it!"

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Russia is more Western than Eastern country culturally. Historically ~20% of Russia which is oldest, most populated (~80% as per Pareto rule) and influental is the western part of the country, bordering European countries.

Yes, and Russian computer scientists are still good, but obviously the US is more Western than Russia, so perhaps that is why they got beat in the competition?

According to this logic Russia should be more similar to US in results while India and China should be more distant. Do test results show that?

Other than all the reserved words and major libraries being in English, what do you mean?

How does western philosophy or culture impact software design? I'd argue that how software works is influenced by how computers work, which is influence by how physics works, which is culture-agnostic. You can't possibly say "binary is so Western". So, what, exactly is influenced by the culture / philosophy?

It is interesting for sure. Americans -- far more than many other countries that I've lived in -- are incredibly legalistic, which, while perhaps annoying in personal life, is a boon when it comes to programming / computers.

That would be a good explanation if people from other cultures couldn't program worth a damn, but they clearly can.

Yes, they can still program, but not as good as the US (clearly). I didn't say that culture was the defining factor of being able to program or not, just that it could be the factor for what puts the US on top of other countries.

I don't think it's a question of skill. The US has more big tech companies because of its approach to business and regulation (if that's what you mean by culture), not the raw skill of its US-born workers.

I mean, look at the leadership of a lot of these companies. They're foreign-born, typically from Asia.

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