Cooking may not be the best analogy. What if everyone started learning to build bridges instead? Sure, the general population might benefit from knowing how bridges work and what loads they can take, but when a bunch of inexperienced, improperly educated bridge-builders start trying to create new ones because it pays well, we end up with dangerous bridges.

Jeff's article is trying to point out that while understanding code isn't a bad thing, coding isn't the most important part of writing software. Those who think it is end up writing code without purpose, something I consider as dangerous in the long term as shoddy bridges.