Nostr Web Client

Hot take 🌶️: "not everyone needs to be a programmer". I have to disagree.

Over time, computers will play an ever larger role in our lifes. Sure most consumer software is " dumbed down" so that it can easily be used by complete idiots.

It's undeniable that people with computers skills will have the upper hand. These are the people who will be in the front seat. The ones who can actually audit, modify and build the code that runs our entire lives.

Saying that not everyone needs to be a programmer will be like saying now that not everyone needs to learn how to read. I mean, sure... you don't need to, but if you don't you won't be useful and will be enslaved by others who do.

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Discussion

Fuchs 2y ago

Good take! This is why I started to learn coding some weeks ago… will be one of the most important skills in future

MTozoni ⚡😺 2y ago

Counterpoint: knowing programming doesn't mean you know money or business. A lot of programmers who understand tech very well still don't get Bitcoin and think it's worthless or a scam. If you understand money, you can just stack sats and eventually hire whatever programmers you want.

sommerfeld 2y ago

The tech illiterate get constantly preyed on by big tech regardless of their wealth.

You can't trust anyone but yourself, your hired programmer will just exit scam you for a price.

MTozoni ⚡😺 2y ago

Any sufficiently good programmer can exit scam you with complex enough code. Depending on what you hire them for. Contractors and others can take your money and leave without finishing the work too. At some point you just have to trust and go with the person's reputation (p.s. I'm not reading hundreds of thousands of lines of code to see if the app I use will screw me, and I don't have months to spend on writing my own app either).

sommerfeld 2y ago

Fair point. In general I agree, if you have money, you can be completely skill-less and get by.

Dr.EAD 2y ago

secondary counterpoint:

No. 🫥😂

Computers only have to “play as much of a role” as you want them to, considering the circumstances. Many don’t want that role at all, and are actively diminishing it.

Worst case scenario, greek cynicism is always an option. Be like Diogenes, feast at the table of the gods. 😌😎🤪😂

In that sense, I can easily imagine a future-world like Astro Boy or New Genesis, from DC comics.

People who prefer to live “primitively” can freely do so on the surface world, those who’ve chosen otherwise can as well. A major (but peaceful and reasonable) dichotomous split in society.

sommerfeld 2y ago

Fair counterpoint, you just played the Luddite card, well done!

Sure, it's a life style choice but placing those sorts of restrictions will also place you at a competitive disadvantage.

IMO it only works if you live in a completely isolated luddite bubble. That reminds me of that Futurama episode 🤣

Dr.EAD 2y ago

Nooot really ludditism bro — that’s more like “Tech is evil cause it steals jobs, YOU can’t use it.” Hence the whole destroying other people’s textile machinery and all that.

THIS is more like: I don’t like YOUR tech, so I’M not going to use it, or to decide exactly the role it’s going to play in my life. VEEEERY different.

To suggest that everyone MUST use the newest form of every kind of tech as soon it appears is far more absurd, AND far more authoritarian, and much more like ludditism in that way.

sommerfeld 2y ago

If a new tech just out competes/obsoletes you, it's irrelevant whether you like it or not or from whom it comes from.

Sure you can just ignore it's existence but it will still slow you down.

If you're talking about useless tech like home AI assistants or IoT "smart" appliances, I absolutely agree with you.

Dr.EAD 2y ago

Dude you’re totally missing my point 😂😅 so please allow me to be clear:

1. To your og point, I don’t deny programming skills have significant and broad value in “today’s economy”

2. Nor that, by conventional standards, such skills would be a boon

(Ignoring for the moment obvious counterpoints regarding the utility of specialization, and resulting decrease of previously considered “pragmatic skills” within populations of growing economies)

But as to my point: what IS a boon? Wealth? Power? Those don’t mean the same thing to everybody. To some, including many who are rich in both, they’re nothing at all.

And what does it mean to be “slowed down”? A lot of people say that’s exactly what they want. Others blame technology for doing exactly that — “taking” their time (via maintenance duties, bad habits, etc.) they’d rather spend on other things.

(And as to the Cynics, like Diogenes, they’d *reject* such conventional standards, and live “like dogs”)

Hence why so many don’t hold BTC. They can see the initial cost-to-entry, and despite potential long term profit (via anti-inflationary hodling, etc.) this initial cost of learning and effort would “slow them down” from the OTHER things they’d rather be doing.

DZC 2y ago

It has somehow reminded me to a Brave New World. 🤔

sommerfeld 2y ago

Omg yes!

DZC 2y ago

"South-south-west, south, south-east, east. …"

Such a meaningful book.

Dr.EAD 2y ago

Similar analogy, altho I was trying to be a little more fair to the “developed”/futuristic society, which is clearly antagonized for depraved in BNW.

Hence my point was John the “savage” could certainly exist in the future — altho to your point, yes, obviously he’d have a hard time existing in both worlds simultaneously.