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Comment by vasilipupkin | Hacker News Reader

Just because we currently teach everyone trigonometry, it does not mean we should also teach everyone X. What exactly is the point of knowing how to code a little, without being very good or proficient at it, which most people won't be able to attain ? But I do agree that every school should have C.S. curricula as an option, not as a requirement

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Most people in developed countries need to handle significant amounts of information. Knowing how to code a little (even just simple loops and conditions) allows you to be an order of magnitude more productive.

Which people? Sorry but forget about most people, most programmers themselves don't need to handle significant amounts of information.

Most people need to learn how to cook, first aid, read, basic personal finance, hygiene, basic mechanical work etc etc the list is endless.

You can only chose a few at a time. And even then things are so big these days, you can probably learn one or two correctly if you were to even dedicate years learning it.

The thing is most people don't know what they want to do. That's the reason why schools force you take a variety of subjects so you could find your niche. I had no intention of growing up and becoming a developer, but here I am, all because my friend showed me a few lines of HTML. The idea is to give people a little spark and let them follow through if they want to continue down this path or not.

We certainly don't currently teach everyone trig...

I think everyone should know enough programming to know where programming is an appropriate tool, even if they are not also to wield it, so that they can bring in someone else to solve it with programming, instead of throwing manpower at problems like copy pasting between documents.

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