People need to understand how computers work because they put a lot of trust and faith in their computers. At any time, the computer might be sending your financial details to a criminal, or taking pictures of you and sending that to a criminal. This sort of overwhelming trust is easily abused.
Learning to program is a good step to understanding how computers work. Making software "inspectable" or "modifiable" by ordinary people allows them to learn more about what's going on, and become accountable for it.
I might be wrong, and there are indeed lots of things in people's lives that they don't understand, but it's still a good thing to take into account. Computers in a sense "do more" than most other machines, and our connection with them is more intimate, so it's perhaps more important for us to understand how our computers work than, for instance, how our cars works.
Learning to program is a good step to understanding how computers work. Making software "inspectable" or "modifiable" by ordinary people allows them to learn more about what's going on, and become accountable for it.
I might be wrong, and there are indeed lots of things in people's lives that they don't understand, but it's still a good thing to take into account. Computers in a sense "do more" than most other machines, and our connection with them is more intimate, so it's perhaps more important for us to understand how our computers work than, for instance, how our cars works.