Except for the reading part that's exactly like software engineering. Since when does a software engineer ever start from scratch? We all build on top of what w

Except for the reading part that's exactly like software engineering. Since when does a software engineer ever start from scratch? We all build on top of what was before. As for "the field does progress and removes bad ideas or clarifies good ideas", that's best practices. That's new and better programming languages and libraries. Better operating systems. And "that mountain of work" has gotten us from punch cards to the Internet.