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I think he addresses this point pretty well -- you can learn good programming practices through apprenticeship/experience without understanding the deeper fundamentals. You won't be creating the next MapReduce, but you'll be able to remix and hack up existing functionality in new and creative ways.

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From the other end though, this can result in a lot of cargo-cult programming. "this is how to do it" can create a ton of redundancy (the bad kind) if the underlying mechanisms are not understood sufficiently.

Even having the underlying ability to understand something sufficiently doesn't imply you'll automatically do so. There are plenty of times even a properly educated person on the subject matter at hand will miss opportunities to apply their knowledge. Recognition of a given scenario is a test of your analytic ability, not sheer know-how.

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