My pithy description of software development is "a series of decisions in pursuit of a goal". dogma invites people to stop using their critical thinking skills

My pithy description of software development is "a series of decisions in pursuit of a goal". dogma invites people to stop using their critical thinking skills. One of my favorite examples of this: Everyone would agree that having a newborn in a car means safety is paramount. Everyone also agrees that left turns are less safe than right turns. No one would agree that this implies you should never make left turns in a vehicle with a newborn. ^But the above is how both security people and TDD proponents tend to act, as if there can be no risk assessment and critical thinking involved. We've all made right hand turns when we really wanted to go left because there was just too much traffic, even without a newborn in the vehicle.