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This is one of those things where I’ve lived the XKCD comic (https://xkcd.com/793/ https://xkcd.com/793/). I once had a job where I was part of the supporting

This is one of those things where I’ve lived the XKCD comic (https://xkcd.com/793/ https://xkcd.com/793/). I once had a job where I was part of the supporting technical crew for some very smart people with some truly impressive accomplishments. A colleague and I sometimes groused about the challenges of working with “universal domain specialists.”

dkarl 4y ago
Tests and version control... why do you bother with all that ceremony? It seems like a lot of work that could go towards making the code better. To play devil's advocate, though, I do think that something is lost if everyone stops themselves from asking questions on the grounds that everyone has good reasons for everything they do and therefore there's no point having thoughts about someone else's job. Even if you assume the first part, the second doesn't follow. Understanding other people's jobs helps you work better with them, and if you don't understand the purpose of something they're doing, that probably indicates an opportunity to understand them better. Second, looking at it from the other side, we all benefit from answering beginner questions. What's the difference between the innocence of a child and the innocence of somebody who has studied physics their whole life and never had to support a piece of software? When children, or physicists, ask questions that are hard for us to answer, we can learn something in the attempt. The only difference between being posed "dumb" questions by a child and an adult from another field is if they think you're an idiot. (Honestly, that isn't even a difference. We just don't mind if children walk around thinking adults are all idiots most of the time. We expect differently from them after they grow up.) Reading between the lines, I think some people regard the momentary joy of thinking you see something that someone else doesn't as a bit of corruption in the soul, a moral root cause. I don't think it's a bad thing, though. Imagine playing chess against someone much better than you and getting excited because you think you can take a piece and get a winning advantage. The odds are very high that you are wrong, or that you're going to take the piece and then lose anyway, but what are you going to do? You're going to take the piece, pose them the question! Or else there's no fun in playing the game. Some people would argue that the excitement that arises in your mind at that point is wrong, not just in the sense of not being supported by reason, but a morally wrong response, arrogant, disrespectful of the better player, a toxic feeling that we should strive to eliminate and certainly strive not to show to other people. But it isn't necessarily, and we don't have to take it that way. Where it can change from innocent to annoying and even toxic, depending on how people handle it, is when the expert can't provide an answer that satisfies the innocent. At that point the innocent (or the expert) might get angry or condescending, or might simply badger the other person in a time-wasting way, insisting that the matter can't be dropped until agreement is reached. Or one or both of them might walk away thinking the other person is an idiot. But that doesn't have to happen. They can let it go gracefully. The innocent can walk away thinking, "I don't understand their reason for doing that," the expert can walk away thinking, "I don't know how to explain it to someone with their background," and they both have food for further thought.
1letterunixname 4y ago
Trying to "math" love, joy, sadness, etc. The "logic" or "calculus" is to stop thinking and start feeling. Easy to say, but can come with time, patience, and generosity through vulnerability. Find the good and the joy in this short life and don't waste it on anything else. Christ, I sound like a minister giving an unsolicited sermon at the holiday festival. Hope and perseverance are the essential ingredients. If you're bad with (people, men, women), then do the hard work to not be. If you suck at math, ball up that judgment and set it outside. If you have a dead-end job, starting a business is paperwork and office furniture. Find something (action or item) people will pay more for than it costs but give a little extra than they paid for. Be rational, honest, reasonable, and work as smartly and consistently as possible. It's not easy, but there is much potential power in one's own hands and mind. Now, I sound like Anthony Robins. :)

dkarl 4y ago

Tests and version control... why do you bother with all that ceremony? It seems like a lot of work that could go towards making the code better. To play devil's advocate, though, I do think that something is lost if everyone stops themselves from asking questions on the grounds that everyone has good reasons for everything they do and therefore there's no point having thoughts about someone else's job. Even if you assume the first part, the second doesn't follow. Understanding other people's jobs helps you work better with them, and if you don't understand the purpose of something they're doing, that probably indicates an opportunity to understand them better. Second, looking at it from the other side, we all benefit from answering beginner questions. What's the difference between the innocence of a child and the innocence of somebody who has studied physics their whole life and never had to support a piece of software? When children, or physicists, ask questions that are hard for us to answer, we can learn something in the attempt. The only difference between being posed "dumb" questions by a child and an adult from another field is if they think you're an idiot. (Honestly, that isn't even a difference. We just don't mind if children walk around thinking adults are all idiots most of the time. We expect differently from them after they grow up.) Reading between the lines, I think some people regard the momentary joy of thinking you see something that someone else doesn't as a bit of corruption in the soul, a moral root cause. I don't think it's a bad thing, though. Imagine playing chess against someone much better than you and getting excited because you think you can take a piece and get a winning advantage. The odds are very high that you are wrong, or that you're going to take the piece and then lose anyway, but what are you going to do? You're going to take the piece, pose them the question! Or else there's no fun in playing the game. Some people would argue that the excitement that arises in your mind at that point is wrong, not just in the sense of not being supported by reason, but a morally wrong response, arrogant, disrespectful of the better player, a toxic feeling that we should strive to eliminate and certainly strive not to show to other people. But it isn't necessarily, and we don't have to take it that way. Where it can change from innocent to annoying and even toxic, depending on how people handle it, is when the expert can't provide an answer that satisfies the innocent. At that point the innocent (or the expert) might get angry or condescending, or might simply badger the other person in a time-wasting way, insisting that the matter can't be dropped until agreement is reached. Or one or both of them might walk away thinking the other person is an idiot. But that doesn't have to happen. They can let it go gracefully. The innocent can walk away thinking, "I don't understand their reason for doing that," the expert can walk away thinking, "I don't know how to explain it to someone with their background," and they both have food for further thought.

1letterunixname 4y ago

Trying to "math" love, joy, sadness, etc. The "logic" or "calculus" is to stop thinking and start feeling. Easy to say, but can come with time, patience, and generosity through vulnerability. Find the good and the joy in this short life and don't waste it on anything else. Christ, I sound like a minister giving an unsolicited sermon at the holiday festival. Hope and perseverance are the essential ingredients. If you're bad with (people, men, women), then do the hard work to not be. If you suck at math, ball up that judgment and set it outside. If you have a dead-end job, starting a business is paperwork and office furniture. Find something (action or item) people will pay more for than it costs but give a little extra than they paid for. Be rational, honest, reasonable, and work as smartly and consistently as possible. It's not easy, but there is much potential power in one's own hands and mind. Now, I sound like Anthony Robins. :)