Programming Is Not Math

Fun and interesting blog addressing the belief that mathematics is necessary for programming, a misconception that Nathan Ensmenger claims has reduced the percentage of women in computing.  Sarah Mei goes into some depth addressing (and dispensing with) each of the three claims below

Specifically, learning to program is more like learning a new language than it is like doing math problems. And the experience of programming today, in industry, is more about language than it is about math.And my next thought, of course, was why doesn’t anyone else think this? Why do we still have this idea that math skills indicate programming potential, while language skills mean you should go into poli sci?Well, when I feel out of my depth, I usually start by looking for “official” opinions. So I looked for relevant academic research.
WTF ACADEMIA?!?

I found absolutely none, which is pretty flabbergasting. I found a lot of opinions, both from computer science educators, and from people in industry. Perhaps within academia, the link between math and programming is considered such an obvious truth that it isn’t worth confirming with research.It seems more likely, though, that this research exists, but not under the search terms I tried. Please let me know if you are aware of relevant papers.In the meantime, if we can’t have data, we can at least examine the conversations people have on this topic. Here are some things people often say when asserting that people must be good at math to be good developers.Generally, they fall into three categories:

1. “You need to know math to be a good programmer.”

2. “You need to learn math to get the skills you need for programming.”

3. “Plenty of programming is still math!”

via Sarah Mei » Programming Is Not Math.