vunderba an hour ago

Spot on critical analysis of the blog post "Developers reinvented" by Github Thomas Dohmke which includes such quotes as:

> Many Computer Science (CS) programs still center around problems that AI can now solve competently.

Yeah. No they do not. Competent CS programs focus on fundamentals not your ability to invert a binary tree on a whiteboard. [1]

Replacing linear algebra and discrete mathematics with courses called "Baby's First LLM" and "Prompt Engineering for Hipster Doofuses" is as vapid as proposing that CS should include an entire course on how to use git.

[1] https://x.com/mxcl/status/608682016205344768

  • charcircuit 21 minutes ago

    >not your ability to invert a binary tree on a whiteboard.

    Knowing how to swap 2 variables and traverse data structures are fundamentals.

pcwelder an hour ago

>I found, a required sample size for just one thousand people would be 278

It's interesting to note that for a billion people this number changes to a whopping ... 385. Doesn't change much.

I was curious, with 22 sample size (assuming unbiased sample, yada yada), while estimating the proportion of people satisfying a criteria, the margin of error is 22%.

While bad, if done properly, it may still be insightful.

ma73me an hour ago

I'll never judge an article by its HN header again

sixhobbits an hour ago

> The sample size is 22. According to this sample size calculator I found, a required sample size for just one thousand people would be 278

I'm all for criticizing a lack of scientific rigor, but this bit pretty clearly shows that the author knows even less about sample sizes than the GitHub guy, so it seems a bit pot calling the kettle black. You certainly don't need to sample more than 25% of any population in order to draw statistical information from it.

The bit about running the study multiple times also seems kinda random.

I'm sure this study of 22 people has a lot of room for criticism but this criticism seems more ranty than 'proper analysis' to me.

  • astrobe_ 22 minutes ago

    > The bit about running the study multiple times also seems kinda random.

    Reproducibility? But knowing it comes from the CEO of Github, who has vested interests in that matter because AI is one of the things that will allow to maintain Github's position on the market (or increase revenue of their paid plans, once everyone is hooked on vibe coding etc.), anyone would anyway take it with a grain of salt. It's like studies funded by big pharma.

  • foma-roje 36 minutes ago

    > You certainly don't need to sample more than 25% of any population in order to draw statistical information from it.

    Certainly? Now, who is ranting?

croes an hour ago

The statistics part will also be relevant for the rest of Trump‘s presidency