Yes this is true for every profession... but in programming it seems to be a more crucial thing as the programming world is changing and evolving faster than any other industry.. just think about what programmers used to do 10 years ago .. and what we do now... think how computers change in 10 years... (my mobile phone is smarter/faster than my state of the art PC from 10 years ago)
The progression rate is astonishing and we must not forget that we still have to learn the basics in order to be good at what we do...