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Senior Member
My CS prof once asked our class, about eighty or so freshman CS majors, who wants to be a programmer. Some rose their hands; I did not. He then told those people to put their hands down. He informed us that a programmer is the sort of person who goes to ITT Tech or some place like that and who are doomed to be a code monkey in a cubicle. We should aspire to be computer scientists.
I think this is a very important point. Merely learning how to program in a language or two isn't going to get you anywhere, professionally that is. If your sole goal is programming as a hobby, more power to you. But if you're considering a career in computers, you'll want a good deal of formal education on more abstract subjects.
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"The computer programmer is a creator of universes for which he alone is responsible. Universes of virtually unlimited complexity can be created in the form of computer programs." -- Joseph Weizenbaum.
"If you cannot grok the overall structure of a program while taking a shower, you are not ready to code it." -- Richard Pattis.
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