IMO this was already evident in some goods like vehicles. We are already living in the era of the 100k pickup truck. You can hardly buy anything new that is decent under 40k nowadays.

Unless we see commensurate rises in wages we are in for some real difficulty if this continues.

This promulgation and advocacy of laziness and know-nothing-ism is frightening and all too commonplace nowadays.

The ACID example was a bad one, granted, but everyone seems to be giving up after identifying that. I also think that this post is not about interviewing. I am much more concerned with the line the author takes about knowing how a digital computer work is even necessary. How have we arrived at this point?

As an example, how seriously would you take an aircraft flight controls software engineer who willfully chooses to never learn how an airplane flies? What if they just claimed that their sole responsibility was to take flight requirements from “people who know how airplanes work” and implement code? Knowing how horrific the results of this attitude is in even low pressure business situations, would you get on the plane he designed the software for?

People who live by and spread the idea that one only need know the things he or she is ‘required to know’ are dangerous for engineering organizations. When something goes horribly wrong, your mission critical system crashes, when you get dragged before the higher ups to explain the situation and fix it, the excuse ‘I don’t have to know how this works to do my job’ simply won’t fly.

People have lost all respect for the pursuit of excellence. Ask yourself who you would like to have on your team: someone who stops at learning the bare minimum to get paid and inevitably ruins the integrity of a product or someone who continually pursues getting better at their job and accelerates the people around them? Would you rather work with someone who values knowledge or someone who doesn’t?

I think it is drastically foolish to defend the toleration of those who aren’t even willing to learn basics like how a computer works in the name of inclusivity, utilitarianism, or egalitarianism.

Furthermore, I know a slew of extremely bright, tenacious, and committed young people who are ruthlessly pursuing excellence in engineering. If given the chance and enough time they will easily outperform, outwork, and surpass anyone who adheres to these lazy practices. If you do think this way and don’t want these kids to take your job then I suggest you buckle down a bit and learn some basics.

Look, invoking "straw man" is a bit of a cliche around here, but to say:

> As an example, how seriously would you take an aircraft flight controls software engineer who willfully chooses to never learn how an airplane flies? What if they just claimed that their sole responsibility was to take flight requirements from “people who know how airplanes work” and implement code?

is highly disingenuous given that learning to dig into what needs to be built is explicitly laid out in the article as the opposite of memorizing acronyms about how one might build it, and:

> I think it is drastically foolish to defend the toleration of those who aren’t even willing to learn basics like how a computer works in the name of inclusivity, utilitarianism, or egalitarianism.

seems to me to be far out of left field given that the article in question isn't speaking in the name of any of those things, but instead comparing to the value of other kinds of knowledge and expertise. If you feel the need to invoke "inclusivity" in this conversation, that only speaks to your own mindset.

I would much rather work with people who are able to analyze what kinds of knowledge actually drive their getting better results at their job than with people who assume going lower on the stack must equal "excellence in engineering".

> As an example, how seriously would you take an aircraft flight controls software engineer who willfully chooses to never learn how an airplane flies?

This describes exactly the Boeing and MCAS fiasco. In fact, not only did Boeing hire do this, they outsourced the work overseas. People overseas are capable of doing great work, but they do the work exactly the the spec and nothing more. If you don't have an internal engineering process to account for situations unique to software, there's no way you can ensure that what they deliver is fit for purpose.

> Furthermore, I know a slew of extremely bright, tenacious, and committed young people who are ruthlessly pursuing excellence in engineering.

Those types of kids are going extinct. The kids coming up now are entirely smart-phone raised. An actual computer is an afterthought, they can't even explain what a file is. We're headed for the software engineering dark ages.

I agree, as long as the attempt at expertise is not at the expense of getting stuff done. I have met people who have a great grasp of foundational principles and it shows. I have met other people who take so long trying to understand something before they use it, they don't get their work done.

You are so right about the pursuit of excellence being important but the industry is still way too fragmented. If a Doctor said they don't really need to know stuff, they would work it out as they went along, they wouldn't work for long. In Software Engineering, we are still treated (and act!) like some basic trade where the risks are low enough not to care.

How is an aircraft flight controls software a good example? I think everyone would agree someone building such software should know how a plane works. But do they have to be an aeronautical engineer? No. Where do you draw the line? There is a difference between flight control where lives are at stake and say spitting out a CRUD feature as fast as possible to see if anything sticks to reach market before the competition, then switching gears accordingly. If I deep-dived and skilled up to excellence on every technology I touched I'd still be on the first one. If all software were designed to NASA standards we would not be where we are now.

I don't expect a web designer to know how NAND gates or how to program in C because it's irrelevant. If they spent time learning that on the job, that's likely a waste of time. Abstractions exist for a reason.

I agree completely though that lazy people are out there. Professionals should always be learning and trying to improve their craft. Learning the bare minimum shouldn't be the default.

> When something goes horribly wrong, your mission critical system crashes, when you get dragged before the higher ups to explain the situation and fix it, the excuse ‘I don’t have to know how this works to do my job’ simply won’t fly.

At that point you just get another job and in the interview talk about how the company had bad practices that caused X bad thing.