I agree, though I don't think that core x86 (especially in real mode) is as bad as he seems to think - it started out as a 16-bit extension to the 8080 after all, and can be used that way.

Low-level computing is even more amazing when you learn how to decode and execute simple instructions with a few logic gates.

Beyond that is in many ways a matter of interfacing and scale (at which point abstraction layers can be very useful.)