This is a 2nd version of the previous article because my quote blotted out part of the article in case you want to read all I was saying

  You start with a bunch of switches that are either on or off. Depending whether each switch is on or off it can mean almost anything symbolically as you move up symbolically into computer languages from zeros and ones which is called "Machine Language". In other words the machine ONLY thinks in Zeros and ones. Also, "Thinks" is of course euphemistically and a way of anthropomorphizing the computer into a form like it's a dog or cat or friend and becomes more intimate to you for convenience of thought and actions. However, a computer from a human point of view does not think because it is mathematical only and not really capable of intuitive or emotional thought at all but only mathematical ways of functioning.

However, it can as it moves up through "symbolically" through machine language to Computer languages created for the convenience of human thought more than anything else because it is almost impossible to make humans think in zeros and ones in a binary fashion. It's true it can be done but might take years or months or weeks to make the same sense as you might in a computer language within minutes, days or weeks instead of years figuring things out.

And then computer languages often are built one after the other on top of each other as new ones are created which also can slow down a computers functions as a direct result. So, the closer your code resembles Machine language (in other words zeros and ones) the faster this computer will tend to process information in almost all cases.

This is one reason that some companies hire programmers to work in COBOL because the processing will work faster and give information quicker than in newer languages more efficiently and quicker with less monetary investment. I met one man from India on Mt. Shasta that worked in Sacramento programming in COBOL still because of this even though Cobol is likely out of the 1950s as a programming language.

Cobol is about 60 years old by the way. It was invented in 1959 and I studied it in 1966 in college when I was a College Freshman then.

1959

In 1959, a group of programmers devised COBOL, a Common, Business-Oriented Language. Programs written in COBOL could run on more than one manufacturer's computer.

COBOL: Introduction | National Museum of American History