Some of us are old enough to remember when assembler was supposed to rot your brain. When BASIC or COBOL or another compiler was going to make you stupid. When new tools and new abstractions were viewed as scary by some folks.
Who said stuff like this? The outsourced-java-monkeys of yesteryear?
I doubt many computer scientists said this.
That was a pretty commonly heard perspective from lecturers and tutors when I was studying Comp Sci in ~85 or so - that kids who'd learnt a bit of basic at school (or on their AppleII or ZX81) needed to "unlearn" all their bad habits before they could understand a _proper_ language like Pascal...
Re:Doctorow: Why I won't buy an iPad
by ubernostrum on Sunday April 04, 2010 @05:58AM
(#1239992)
I doubt many computer scientists said this.
"[T]he teaching of BASIC should be rated as a criminal offence: it mutilates the mind beyond recovery." -- Edsger W. Dijkstra
There were many smart people that did smart things in the USSR too, but it doesn't mean it was better. In many ways, this is more like transitioning computing away from a Democracy (or an Anarchy depending on how you look at it) to rule by a Benevolent Leader. Maybe the Benevolent Leader does some great things that benefit a lot of people, but sometimes this is at the cost of the people the cross the Benevolent Leader's path. And then there is the question of "what happens when the Benevolent Leader dies?" Who will take over the reins?
I trust the kids. They're smart. Smarter than us.
Hand'm all iPads. I can't wait to see what they'll come up with.