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Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

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Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#71

Post by dstroot »

NegatioN wrote: post #62

I'm not sure if these books really are what you're looking for, because each of them is a mix of engineering history, and the description of how a group of people end up doing amazing things. In each of the books, there were nuggets of wisdom that I've tried to bring along with me in my job (as best I can). Like: - Doing things as simply as possible to start off - Keeping iteration time to a minimum, for maximum expl…

+1 for Skunk Works. Great story, well written and the engineering challenges they overcame were astounding.

Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#72

Post by undershirt »

jonjacky wrote: post #30

Don't overlook books that are critical of engineering as it is often practiced and how it fits into our society: Computer Power and Human Reason by Joseph Weizenbaum (1976). Weizenbaum wrote Eliza, the first AI chatbot, almost sixty years ago and was appalled at the reception. This book is still very pertinent, especially the Introduction, Chapter 1 On Tools, chapter 9, Incomprehensible Programs, and chapter 10, Agai…

I’ll second this. A philosophy for engineering is nestled I think in the larger “philosophy of technology”, but this field of philosophy has traditionally been a lot more critical of technology than most of us can stomach today. This is a really good map of the field that not many know about, written in 1995:

https://shaunlebron.github.io/chandler-1995.pdf

Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#74

Post by pjmorris »

ChicagoBoy11 wrote: post #50

Not totally what you are looking for, but I'd highlghly recommend "Apollo" by Murray and Cox. It focuses on the engineering history of the Apollo program, and it is a superbly well written and researched worked and so many of the stories are about engineering philosophy that I think it'll really be worth your while.

Seconded, phenomenal book and suggestion.

IMO in a similar vein is 'The Making of the Atomic Bomb', Richard Rhodes, another industry- and world-reshaping project.

Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#77

Post by Pamar »

philip1209 wrote: post #51

I recommend Shop Class as Soulcraft, which contrasts blue-collar work (motorcycle repair) with knowledge work. It's not specifically "tech"-related, but it does a good job of exploring how corporatization has diminished the ability to be a craftsperson in modern careers.

You can get an overview of "Shop Class as Soulcraft" here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8280379

Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#78

Post by pixelmonkey »

I love your passion!

When I was CTO of a software startup, I wrote a blog post reviewing various books about engineering and software teams, neatly organized into six sections. The three sections that you might find interesting, each featuring a few relevant books:

- Debugging dysfunctional product cultures: https://amontalenti.com/2020/11/28/definitive-reading-list#d...

- The psychology of deep work: https://amontalenti.com/2020/11/28/definitive-reading-list#p...

- Programmer mindset and philosophy: https://amontalenti.com/2020/11/28/definitive-reading-list#p...

Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#79

Post by robto »

They say naming is one of the hard problems of computer science, but there's not much concrete work addressing it.

I'd recommend Elements of Clojure[0].

Don't be fooled by the title, it's not really about Clojure, it just uses Clojure as an illustration as it discusses a very subtle general problem. From the website:

> The first chapter, Names, explains why names define the structure of our software, and how to judge whether a name is any good.

> The second chapter, Idioms, provides specific, syntactic advice for writing Clojure which is clean and readable.

> The third chapter, Indirection, looks at how code can be made simpler and more robust through separation.

> The final chapter, Composition, explores how the constituent pieces of our code can be combined into an effective whole.

I find it a thoughtful and considerate overview of an area that everybody has some implicit knowledge of, and something that leads to a more abstract concept of quality.

[0]https://elementsofclojure.com/

Re: Ask HN: Good books on philosophy of engineering?

#80

Post by Loic »

In How to Build Impossible Things, Ellison tells the story of his unconventional education in the world of architecture and design, and how he learned the satisfaction and joy that comes from doing something well for a long time.

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/447751/how-to-build-impossib...

Enjoyable, not a philosophy of engineering but philosophy with engineering.

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