That's funny I had the same reaction to cocoa then you.. I was even more shocked when I tried python ( what you mean my whitespace is now a control mechanism for a code block? ). My brain just can't see indented code without bracket...

Anyway, to answer your question which is quite good ( btw congrats on calling beta dead many months before Wired ), I think it's math applied to information science ( in college, in canada ). It's was really useful to have a complete semester only on bool algebra and related topics, having a test completely in binary was weird however.

I still use that knowledge every days, it's funny because at university we get all those advanced math class and well I don't remember any of them, even if they were much more expensive.