Deserves a serious answer

Question in the bitcoin-skeptic section of Reddit, titled ‘A genuine good faith question’.

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I’m a huge crypto skeptic. But I see that a core principle here is the belief that blockchain as a concept or technology (unrelated to BTC) is useless or a “scam”. My question is, why does every major educational institution (including top computer science programs like MIT, UIUC, Berkeley, etc) all have 100-400 level courses teaching blockchain concepts?

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It is a serious question, and it deserves a serious answer. I won’t bother to write on Reddit, because experience and observation are valueless in the online world. Experience and observation are “anecdotal”. Only credentialed citations are “data”. So I’ll give the experience-based answer here, since I’m focusing on Real World Math this week.

There’s a crucial difference between Computer Science and Programming, just as there’s a crucial difference between Academic Math and real math.

Analogies:

The left column items are metalevel. They evaluate and argue about the REAL SKILLS in the right column.

If the NYTimes lists a book as a bestseller, it doesn’t mean the book exists.

If a movie gets an Oscar, it doesn’t mean the movie is entertaining.

If Michelin gives five stars, it doesn’t mean the food is edible.

If CompSci devotes attention to bitcoin, it doesn’t mean bitcoin is useful.

I’ve never taken a CompSci course. I’ve been programming for 40 years, including a lot of experience with the same type of programming that Satoshi used in his bitcoin programs. I’ve read his code. I know what it really does, so I know that it isn’t money or value or anything unique or meaningful. It’s just a database or spreadsheet, which can be used to ANALYZE OR DISCUSS real value. But there are dozens of more accessible ways to make a database or spreadsheet, including plain old paper or tally sticks.