

I Am Not A Programmer - Floopsy
http://floopsy.tumblr.com/post/32448842639/i-am-not-a-programmer

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lutusp
> _For me, however, no matter how many new or interesting projects I would
> begin working on, the question that would ultimately appear in my mind would
> be, “Why are you doing this?”_

This is not meant to be critical or in any way superior, but shortly after
acquiring my first programmable calculator in the early 1970s and extending to
the present, I have no doubt about why I write programs -- _programming works_
in a world where nearly nothing else does.

Governments don't work. Religions don't work. Relationships don't work.
Philosophy doesn't work. And psychology certainly doesn't work -- it's a field
with more self-deluding, self-important frauds per square meter than any I can
think of.

But programming works -- if you become skilled at it, you may end up writing
real solutions to real problems that people find useful. I get calls every day
from people who have problems they could easily solve if only they knew how to
program. For example, today I got an e-mail from someone who needed to compute
the relationship between sensor height and volume in an underground storage
tank that (a) had an unknown shape and size, and (b) had also been deformed by
overhead truck traffic over decades. I solved the problem for him, using a
little math knowledge and some simple programming.

Programming is to modern times what literacy was to the Middle Ages -- it puts
you in the enviable position of having an essential skill, one people simply
can't do without.

> _I Am Not A Programmer_

I am a programmer. Looking through my notebooks from the 1960s, I realize I
was a programmer before I had a way to gain access to a computer -- I kept
trying to solve problems algorithmically, years before I had a chance to write
a real algorithm or see it executed.

I think back to the early 19th century, the time of Charles Babbage
(difference engine) and Ada Lovelace (the first computer programmer), and I
think how tragic that they spent their lives pining for access to something we
take for granted.

This isn't to overvalue computers, only to say that having access to computers
now seems like a natural right, a good thing, but being denied that access is
like not being able to breathe. A few decades ago, almost no one realized
this.

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Lutus>

------
ekm2
_Governments don't work. Religions don't work. Relationships don't work.
Philosophy doesn't work. And psychology certainly doesn't work -- it's a field
with more self-deluding, self-important frauds per square meter than any I can
think of._

Mathematics and Physics work too,just saying

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zwdr
I dont really know why I should care that some, to me random, person, doesn't
regard himself a programmer. There really is no valuable information for
anyone who doesnt know that person in that post. So why post it? Who would be
interested?

~~~
acuozzo
> There really is no valuable information for anyone who doesnt know that
> person in that post.

Many people make things accessible via the WWW with no goal or intention to
reach a wider audience than their respective peers.

> So why post it?

To reach his/her peers without having to send it to each one individually.
Alternatively, he/she could be using a blog as a place to vent.

> Who would be interested?

Obviously, HN readers.

~~~
zwdr
HN readers who dont know the person? I really dont think so. It hardly
qualifies as news anyways.

~~~
acuozzo
> HN readers who dont know the person?

They up-voted it, didn't they?

