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The Rise of the New Groupthink

nytimes.com

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Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#71

Post by dextorious »

lhnz wrote: post #59
hammerdr wrote: post #24

There are many parts of this article that boil my blood. The biggest of which is the use of "Groupthink" to describe a practice of creativity. Groupthink has a very specific meaning in many peoples minds which does not apply in this situation. Dilution of the word Groupthink as well as the mischaracterization of a practice the author happens to dislike are both egregious. Creativity is often spoken of as an end. I do…

> If we have 50 programmers working in complete isolation then we will have 50 different programs. Collaboration becomes key to scaling the craft. Since most programs can be broken down into a set of components I believe it should be relatively easy to parallellize the workload.

"""Since most programs can be broken down into a set of components I believe it should be relatively easy to parallellize the workload."""

The "easy" part of your phrase, is the one key misconception that project managers have since the beginning of software engineering. The mythical man-month and peopleware anyone?

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#72

Post by ChristianMarks »

corporalagumbo wrote: post #69
ChristianMarks wrote: post #43

If the group thinkers can re-invent Bolshevism for the classroom and the workplace, allow me to invent my own journalistic sociological gloss to bring attention to a physiological trend that the group thinkers might not appreciate. It is an anthropological finding that the human brain decreased in volume by 10% — about the size of a tennis ball — around the dawn of civilization 20,000 years ago. It is believed that t…

Man, what are you trying to say? Something about small-brained prosocial locusts eating separated chimpanzees because they feel vindictive, is that it?

I am asking how far we want our craniums to shrink in the name of cooperation. There are trade offs. I suggest that cooperation has its sinister aspects. And I believe you should carefully consider the group values you internalize, if at all possible. My career suffered at my previous place of employment once I pointed this out, so one might wish to be circumspect.

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#74

Post by jeffdavis »

hammerdr wrote: post #24

There are many parts of this article that boil my blood. The biggest of which is the use of "Groupthink" to describe a practice of creativity. Groupthink has a very specific meaning in many peoples minds which does not apply in this situation. Dilution of the word Groupthink as well as the mischaracterization of a practice the author happens to dislike are both egregious. Creativity is often spoken of as an end. I do…

"The only way to scale craft is through constant, effective communication."

I am skeptical of the "constant" part. Communication needs to happen, of course, but it doesn't need to happen constantly.

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#75

Post by Selvik »

morsch wrote: post #62
nirvana wrote: post #38

In East Germany, toddlers and grade schoolers were required to go to the bathroom together, with no partitions between the toilets. Privacy was irrelevant because individualism was irrelevant. Even extending into bathroom habits the communist goal was to make people cogs. I'm sure this seemed like "scientific management" to them, and I bet many of them have no idea why it failed. At my last job, all the programmers w…

> In East Germany, toddlers and grade schoolers were required to go to the bathroom together, with no partitions between the toilets. Privacy was irrelevant because individualism was irrelevant. Even extending into bathroom habits the communist goal was to make people cogs. Oh please, what a ridiculous example to bring up in the context of the rest of your post. The GDR did not fail because of a different approach to…

Why are you being so unpleasant? Viewing a desire for bathroom privacy as reactionary is characteristic of the whole set of ideals related to the new soviet man.

"Who needs a "1"? The voice of a "1" is thinner than a squeak. Who will hear it? Only the wife... A "1" is nonsense. A "1" is zero." --Soviet Poem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Soviet_man#Selflessness

EDIT: And yes, the unrealistic dream of building a society of new soviet men is central to the failure of communism. Hayek's criticism of a planned economy is valid but a hypothetical society of very altruistic people could make it work much, much better than it ever did in practice.

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#76

Post by jbooth »

Selvik wrote: post #75
morsch wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> In East Germany, toddlers and grade schoolers were required to go to the bathroom together, with no partitions between the toilets. Privacy was irrelevant because individualism was irrelevant. Even extending into bathroom habits the communist goal was to make people cogs. Oh please, what a ridiculous example to bring up in the context of the rest of your post. The GDR did not fail because of a different approach to…

Why are you being so unpleasant? Viewing a desire for bathroom privacy as reactionary is characteristic of the whole set of ideals related to the new soviet man . "Who needs a "1"? The voice of a "1" is thinner than a squeak. Who will hear it? Only the wife... A "1" is nonsense. A "1" is zero." --Soviet Poem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Soviet_man#Selflessness EDIT: And yes, the unrealistic dream of building a so…

Nobody's defending communism, he's just saying that the bathroom practices were pretty secondary to, you know, the whole communism thing.

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#77

Post by jamesbritt »

JamesLeonis wrote: post #5
jamesbritt wrote: post #2

I have a very comfy and full-featured home-office set-up, but still try to get out at least once a week to (ostensibly) work among other hackers. There are some business advantages to not being cloistered, not the least being people know you exist and may be available for whatever kind of work you do. And it's good to have be around smart geeks who can answer questions or give you a sanity check on ideas. But the big…

Here's an interesting TED talk by Steven Johnson where he argues for exactly what you are saying. http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_johnson_where_good_ideas_com...

BTW, his book The Invention of Air is really good.

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#78

Post by SiVal »

sunir wrote: post #67
SiVal wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if anyone in your group insists he knows the answer, you're out of luck. Reframe: The blind leading the blind. So if anyone in your group doesn't care about your question, you're out of luck. Reframe: I don't know why I even bother. So if anyone in your group is more interested in a different question, you're both out of luck. Reframe: Sorry, class, we're out of time. Yes, it's funny how many ways a bad idea can b…

I believe that is an extreme and cartoonish conclusion to draw from so little information. How do you know that is the experience the children have? The sister comment from another teacher brings facts to the table that explain the intent of the exercise, which is limited in scope and aimed for a specific purpose. Good or bad it is a game to attempt to teach kids it is ok to admit they don't know and to ask for help…

I have enough information to tell that children in this case are forbidden to ask their question unless everyone in the group has the same question, because that information was explicitly given. This is not the same rule as one which allows an individual child to freely ask the teacher whatever he likes, whether his groupmates want to ask or not, if he still feels like asking after trying his peers first.

The former process is controlled by the group; the latter, by the individual.

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#79

Post by Selvik »

jbooth wrote: post #76
Selvik wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are you being so unpleasant? Viewing a desire for bathroom privacy as reactionary is characteristic of the whole set of ideals related to the new soviet man . "Who needs a "1"? The voice of a "1" is thinner than a squeak. Who will hear it? Only the wife... A "1" is nonsense. A "1" is zero." --Soviet Poem http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Soviet_man#Selflessness EDIT: And yes, the unrealistic dream of building a so…

Nobody's defending communism, he's just saying that the bathroom practices were pretty secondary to, you know, the whole communism thing.

What makes you think the bathroom practices are unrelated to communism? It's called totalitarianism for a reason...

Re: The Rise of the New Groupthink

#80

Post by [deleted] »

Selvik wrote: post #79
jbooth wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody's defending communism, he's just saying that the bathroom practices were pretty secondary to, you know, the whole communism thing.

What makes you think the bathroom practices are unrelated to communism? It's called totalitarianism for a reason...

[deleted]
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