Most tech content is bullshit (2020) • Hacker News Board

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#11

Post by louwrentius » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 2:12 PM UTC

bdw5204 wrote: post #10

Most people have no desire to actually use their brain and think independently. For one thing, other people who've blindly accepted a point of view from some authority figure might be nasty to them. Also, they can't possibly imagine that somebody whom they really like/respect or who helped them get some code working might be wrong sometimes. There are very good evolutionary reasons why most humans are wired to confor…

It’s funny to me that you write this down and not be reflective about your own claims.

I don’t buy the quasi-scientific part about evolutionary reasons.

Ad for that matter, I don’t even buy your first claim, that people don’t want to think independently.

But it doesn’t matter in the end, the whole point of the article - to me at least - is that it’s a good thing to always take the time and at least understand the reasons for choices, and challenge them if it makes sense to do so.

If I allow myself a wild stab at things, I think it’s more that people are “trusting” by nature and assume that things are well thought-out, which the article points out.

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#12

Post by CPLX » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:29 PM UTC

bdw5204 wrote: post #10

Most people have no desire to actually use their brain and think independently. For one thing, other people who've blindly accepted a point of view from some authority figure might be nasty to them. Also, they can't possibly imagine that somebody whom they really like/respect or who helped them get some code working might be wrong sometimes. There are very good evolutionary reasons why most humans are wired to confor…

This is nonsense. Leveraging the collective wisdom of the society you’re in is probably the most adaptive thing a human can do in any given situation.

Doing the same thing you observe others doing is going to be the safest choice most likely to preserve your life and allow you to reproduce, and it’s not a close contest at all.

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#13

Post by kazinator » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:36 PM UTC

Most of the time, you should not be inventing your own equivalents of off-the-shelf algorithms. (Let alone something like crypto.)

How much you evaluate the borrowed alternatives (or whether you even evaluate alternatives) entirely depends on how much that choice matters in the situation.

Situations in which the choice doesn't matter are very common, and in situations in which it doesn't matter.

The scientist isn't concerned with "does it matter" but with "does it make an observable difference". But the latter concern is often a luxury or idle preoccupation for the engineer.

Writing code is mostly a kind of engineering; more rarely is it science.

Engineers usually select existing materials and patterns of putting them together to put together a solution.

Engineering isn't entirely creative in every detail, like painting or music. Even painters and musicians reuse from others.

"Why did you resolve this G7 chord to a C?"

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#14

Post by kazinator » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:39 PM UTC

bdw5204 wrote: post #10

Most people have no desire to actually use their brain and think independently. For one thing, other people who've blindly accepted a point of view from some authority figure might be nasty to them. Also, they can't possibly imagine that somebody whom they really like/respect or who helped them get some code working might be wrong sometimes. There are very good evolutionary reasons why most humans are wired to confor…

> While this is adaptive for living in a pre-modern society, this is maladaptive for living in a liberal democracy where being able to think independently and to respectfully disagree with others are among the most critical life skills.

That is utterly false when it comes to science and engineering, where you're standing on the shoulders of the proverbial giants in order to do anything, and reinventing wheels is mainly the path to low productivity.

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#15

Post by aliasxneo » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:41 PM UTC

bdw5204 wrote: post #10

Most people have no desire to actually use their brain and think independently. For one thing, other people who've blindly accepted a point of view from some authority figure might be nasty to them. Also, they can't possibly imagine that somebody whom they really like/respect or who helped them get some code working might be wrong sometimes. There are very good evolutionary reasons why most humans are wired to confor…

This reads like a rant from Richard Dawkins.

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#16

Post by aatd86 » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:47 PM UTC

revskill wrote: post #4

One example is, just use a monothlic framework, or just use Golang. It's not about right or wrong, they lacked contextual information on who you are and when to use it.

Just use Go is fine with me though :p

Why singleing this little programming language? (I understand your point still)

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#17

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:51 PM UTC

bdw5204 wrote: post #10

Most people have no desire to actually use their brain and think independently. For one thing, other people who've blindly accepted a point of view from some authority figure might be nasty to them. Also, they can't possibly imagine that somebody whom they really like/respect or who helped them get some code working might be wrong sometimes. There are very good evolutionary reasons why most humans are wired to confor…

[deleted]

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#18

Post by spacemadness » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:51 PM UTC

One devious form of bullshit is always using the simplest of examples to prove out an architecture pattern and call it a day. I’ve lost count on how many times I’ve seen patterns with glaring open questions and pitfalls the author avoids. Then the cacophony of likes follow from folks who’re likely very early in their career or hobby and don’t know any better. This is very prevalent on iOS development blogs as authors rush to write their blog posts after every WWDC.

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#19

Post by barbariangrunge » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:51 PM UTC

kazinator wrote: post #13

Most of the time, you should not be inventing your own equivalents of off-the-shelf algorithms. (Let alone something like crypto.) How much you evaluate the borrowed alternatives (or whether you even evaluate alternatives) entirely depends on how much that choice matters in the situation. Situations in which the choice doesn't matter are very common, and in situations in which it doesn't matter. The scientist isn't c…

Counter point: writing things from scratch once in a while sharpens your skills and helps you make better decisions in the future about tradeoffs, and let’s you evaluate different implementations without having to resort to a search on hackernews, stack overflow, or GitHub to find out what the trendiest option is

Take exercise for example: it’s all unnecessary work, but it makes you stronger so that you maintain your fitness longer and so when you need to be strong for something, you’re ready

Re: Most tech content is bullshit (2020)

#20

Post by ZephyrBlu » Sun, Jun 18, 2023, 3:56 PM UTC

Compared to most other people and industries techies are actually relatively good on this front, however I still agree with the article that there is a lot of cargo culting.

The author mentions a few reasons why this occurs, but I think it's primarily due to time constraints. Not even "I have deadlines", but "I cannot physically audit everything".

You simply don't have enough time to independently verify every decision that has made in the codebase, and even if you did by the time you were finished there would have been new edits and additions.

Chesterton's fence also applies here. A decision made on a whim might take you hours to investigate, gather context and decide whether it was appropriate or not.

---

Something the author doesn't mention which I think matters a lot here is the level of impact the decision has.

Deciding what to name a variable? Unimportant and reversible. Low impact on other people.

Deciding which framework to use? Important and irreversible. High impact on other people.

Having the correct context and a good mental model for making decisions can help you a lot here. Outsourcing your thinking is useful and correct for a lot of things, but sometimes it can be terrible.

Figure out which problems you cannot safely outsource and spend your brain power on them. They tend to be things which are core to your work, so investigating them almost always gives you valuable knowledge and context that you can share with the rest of your team!