Re:Self-Taught Engineers Often Outperform
by michaelcampbell on Saturday July 19, 2025 @12:40PM
(#44616993)
> The self taught developer will eventually figure it out, if they are intelligent enough to approach the given problem.
> The computer science graduate will generally not even try to figure out a problem in completely unfamiliar territory.
This is interesting because I have seen the exact opposite. It could be different circles we run in, but I've seen a lot of self-taught people who are in it for the money and couldn't care less about doing anything novel. Where a lot of my college colleagues (mind you, this is from the 1980's) were in it because they loved it, and look for new stuff to learn.
I suspect the distinction here is not self-taught vs. college, but rather do it at least partially for passion vs. the job benefits.
I'd bet we both have confirmation bias to our own backgrounds here.
> The computer science graduate will generally not even try to figure out a problem in completely unfamiliar territory.
This is interesting because I have seen the exact opposite. It could be different circles we run in, but I've seen a lot of self-taught people who are in it for the money and couldn't care less about doing anything novel. Where a lot of my college colleagues (mind you, this is from the 1980's) were in it because they loved it, and look for new stuff to learn.
I suspect the distinction here is not self-taught vs. college, but rather do it at least partially for passion vs. the job benefits.
I'd bet we both have confirmation bias to our own backgrounds here.