I'm not suggesting throwing more bodies at a problem is a solution, it's often not. Apollo is a good example of artificial deadlines pushing development effort

I'm not suggesting throwing more bodies at a problem is a solution, it's often not. Apollo is a good example of artificial deadlines pushing development effort. What would've been the impact of pushing back? A launch delay? Okay, maybe a considerable delay. No life was in jeopardy by pushing it back. It was all political (and maybe some orbital mechanics too). Similarly for folks working on life critical systems today - sure, $Company might launch their new thingy sooner, and perhaps nobody dies as a result of shitty code getting shipped. But a week or two's delay is probably worth it. If you're responding to an emergency - that's an entirely different situation. Maybe everything's on fire and you're losing money hand over fist or someone's life is actually in danger - sure, fine, work the stupid hours to solve the immediate problem.