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It's not really either of these things. The curse of expertise in a field is you live and breathe stuff so deeply for so long that you forget what it's like to
by spiffytech 14y ago
It's not really either of these things. The curse of expertise in a field is you live and breathe stuff so deeply for so long that you forget what it's like to not be an expert in your field. You forget what non-experts, or bystanders, don't know, because it's hard to remember a time when you didn't know these things.
Computer people are notorious for having trouble explaining technical issues to computer-illiterates for this exact reason. It's not that their unempathetic - they are trying to explain so that the conversant understands, after all - but rather, they've been experts for so long, they forget which technical terms the conversant should or shouldn't know, or what does and doesn't need to be turned into an analogy. Overcoming this is a difficult skill.
- chris_mahan 14y agoWas it Einstein who said: "If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough"? In any case, I agree that it's hard to explain computer stuff to non-computer people. That does not mean one can then be arrogant toward others.