Well, unless everyone is capable of fooling you, the ability to do so would seem to indicate at least some skill. I’m not sure of the intelligence conversion rate between “capability of deceiving you” and “capability of showing they’re better than you at programming in the particular class you share,” but your realization that the person is actually better at the former and not the latter seems to suggest the individual has a different set of skills, rather than merely being less skilled.
After reading this, I realized that I’d been conflating how easily I believe random information people tell me that I don’t have much of anything invested in and don’t expect them to have reason to lie about (which would probably not take much skill, since it often happens by accident when people are trying to make a joke), and things I’m actually trying to evaluate. I do have a sense of when someone is trying too hard to sound impressive, so then being able to pull it off would indicate skill. I see what you mean now.
Well, unless everyone is capable of fooling you, the ability to do so would seem to indicate at least some skill. I’m not sure of the intelligence conversion rate between “capability of deceiving you” and “capability of showing they’re better than you at programming in the particular class you share,” but your realization that the person is actually better at the former and not the latter seems to suggest the individual has a different set of skills, rather than merely being less skilled.
After reading this, I realized that I’d been conflating how easily I believe random information people tell me that I don’t have much of anything invested in and don’t expect them to have reason to lie about (which would probably not take much skill, since it often happens by accident when people are trying to make a joke), and things I’m actually trying to evaluate. I do have a sense of when someone is trying too hard to sound impressive, so then being able to pull it off would indicate skill. I see what you mean now.