Word & Parable of the day: Chesterton's Fence, example presented to defend the view point that reforms should not be made until the reasoning behind the existing state of affairs is understood.
"The gate or fence did not grow there. It was not set up by somnambulists who built it in their sleep. It is highly improbable that it was put there by escaped lunatics who were for some reason loose in the street. Some person had some reason for thinking it would be a good thing for somebody. And until we know what the reason was, we really cannot judge whether the reason was reasonable. It is extremely probable that we have overlooked some whole aspect of the question, if something set up by human beings like ourselves seems to be entirely meaningless and mysterious. There are reformers who get over this difficulty by assuming that all their fathers were fools; but if that be so, we can only say that folly appears to be a hereditary disease. "
via https://www.science.org/content/blog-post/hpv-infections-friend-and-foe
#wordoftheday
My father had a principle that was both opposite and similar: when you think up a great new idea, you must try and understand why it was not put into practice earlier, and the answer can't be "because everyone since time immemorial has been an idiot".
Sometimes there is a satisfying answer, like: buildings couldn't have such a shape before the advent of reinforced concrete. If you really can't find an answer, assume it's a half-baked idea at best, because you're missing something.

And, yes, my father was an engineer, why do you ask? :p
And a civil engineer at that, a calling where "move fast and break things" does *not* fly, because you pay in blood.

On a more personal note, thanks for appreciating my reminiscing, I feel like his spirit lives on :)

@temptoetiam Or alternatively, try to implement the idea, as that is the fastest way to understand why exactly nobody else did it before...
@abuseofnotation My dad was a civil engineer: nothing fast nor easy in trying out something in real conditions.
He kept an extensive collection of jars full on different sands to think about silos, though :p

@temptoetiam
Its a good principle, saves a lot of wasted effort. But there is the occasional exception. Kary Mullis on his discovery of PCR:

Somehow, I thought, it had to be an illusion. Otherwise it would change DNA chemistry forever. Otherwise it would make me famous. It was too easy. Someone else would have done it and I would surely have heard of it.”

@temptoetiam yes, that!!

When working on software projects, I've often struggled with consequences of decisions made by people not on the team anymore ('why tf did they choose this architecture/library/implementation ???'), because commit messages rarely contain such high level information.

And I was so happy when I encountered the notion of writing ADRs! Architectural Decision Records are simply about documenting decisions by noting the context, limitations, studied options with advantages and drawbacks and why we decided to chose the solution. Why was it not taught during my studies and why is it not done on projects everywhere 😭

@temptoetiam While I agree, in general, there are many problems and very many idiots. The chance of an idiot having done something so bad that sensible people have been scared away from the problem ever since is high. Just look at AI for a current example.
@temptoetiam I think one of the problems is that we don't document failures. Jumping a little, in research, negative results are not considered valuable, even if the effort to get to them is equivalent to the one they would have used to succeed.
@mdione Strong agree.
@temptoetiam @mdione We should invent the "journal of negative results", to publish negative results of well-designed studies.
Top 10 Journals to Publish Your Negative Results - Enago Academy

Publishing negative results promote transparency and public trust in science. With the scientific community waking up to the idea of balanced reporting, the chances of publishing negative results in high impact journals are greater. There are a number of broad scope journals to publish your negative findings.

Enago Academy
@temptoetiam @mdione ooh thank you 🖤 and happy new year !