RE: Moving on

> -----Original Message-----
> From: J. B. Rainsberger [mailto:[email protected]]
> Sent: Monday, January 06, 2003 7:23 PM
> 
> So said  STEURS Stefan  on  2003-01-06 --------------------
> 
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: J. B. Rainsberger [mailto:[email protected]]
> >> Sent: Sunday, December 29, 2002 9:11 PM
> >> 
> >> In a way, yes. I do not build software in a test tube. 
> >> Academic studies may help answer the question, "How does this 
> >> work?" They may answer the question, "Why does this work?" 
> >> But they cannot answer the simpler and more important 
> >> question, "Does this work?" Only real-life experience can 
> >> answer that question.
> >
> >A:Don't touch the furnace, it is hot.
> >A:Don't touch it.
> >B:Ouch.
> >A:I told you not to touch it.  I guess you learnt?
> 
> I don't understand this.

It only makes sense in conjunction with the next paragraph I wrote, not in
isolation.

> >I don't belief so much in real-life experience at least not for those
> >aspects in which cause and effect are not that easily linked.
> >I think that test tubes and academic studies help in the 
> sense that they
> >have controlled contexts in which it is easier to establish the links
> >between causes and effects.
> 
> I don't see how that helps. Academic studies cannot prove 
> anything useful unless it proves extremes.

Not at all.  I think academic studies can provide a lot of insight because
only academia can afford to do them.  They can rely on motivated people at
comparatively low expense rates.  They don't go into extremes but they do a
lot of background reading, they are usually well informed.  I think that
looking into aspects of diffusion of information will certainly explain why
some aspects of XP work the way they do.  Academic studies could explain why
certain XP practices work.  If we understand the underlying principles we
can probably improve software engineering as a whole rather than only the
people who use XP.  This requires a lot of understanding in social,
behavioural, cognitive, psychological and other aspects which I'm sure are
very important to software engineering.

 XP is about 
> programming as a social enterprise. Isolating useful 
> variables in that environment is staggeringly difficult.

Who says we have to isolate variables?  Being able to recognise the aspects
which are of influence can be sufficient.

 Why 
> not then just look at the people doing it, ask questions and 
> actually listen to the answers, even if they're unexpected?

Because that results in mimicing without understanding.  I've given this
example before on another mailing list but I'll state it again.  The
brothers Montgolfier were renowned for their hot air balloons.  They made
balloons famous.  Do you think they understood why their balloons floated in
the air?  They didn't.  They thought it was because of the black smoke that
filled them so they concluded that the more dense the smoke, the better the
balloon would float.  They did not have a clue about the fact that you
needed hot air.  This meant they could never could have explained or even
understood why helium balloons would float as well.  Actually there is a
german, who's name I forgot, who explained why balloons floated and he could
explain why helium balloons would float as well.  Everyone knows the
brothers Montgolfier.  Asking questions and listening to the answers, even
unexpected, may lead us to reproduce without understanding, and if we don't
understand we are not going to improve.

I would like to understand the underlying principles of XP or other
processes.  That's why we probably need academic studies.  Perhaps if we can
explain what the underlying principles are to our bosses, they will more
easily understand the benefits of what we are trying to achieve.

I'll put it differently, I'd like to understand rather than believe.
Believing is easy, understanding is not.

It is of course difficult to understand because we can only understand what
we are able/ready to perceive.  That's why I also have respect for academic
studies.  Usually the people involved have better ways to perceive and are
more independent from what they are observing than people who are deeply
involved, too deeply sometimes.
> 
> >So, if we have contexts that can be transposed then we may 
> have value from
> >test tube and academic studies.
> 
> I believe that the hypothesis is shaky, at best, in this case.

So, if you don't know the context, mimicing is better?  I immitate someone
else and I hope to get the same results?  I'm sure that is not what you want
to imply.  Someone does XP in context A, I am in context B, it sounds that
you are saying that if I do in context B what someone else is doing in
context A I will get similar results.  In my limited experience I don't have
any evidence that this would be the case.
> 
> >"People who want to believe are easily fooled"
> 
> Perhaps, but people who don't listen never learn.

"Where people think alike, no-one thinks very much"?

I've learnt a lot by asking questions, even questions that to other people
seem stupid.
If listening means that I should accept the answer "Because I told you so"
when I ask "Why?" then it seems we are at a dead end.
I don't mind asking these questions.  I think that asking questions to
ourselves and others is what keeps our minds young.  Children always ask
"Why? Why? Why?" and I can identify with that a lot.  We have to think
out-of-the-box.  We confine ourselves too much to what other people say is
true.  Does that sound anarchistic?  Perhaps it does.  We have to keep
challenging ourselves and others to find alternatives.  The moment we stop
asking "why" is the moment we grow old.  The moment we stop answering is the
moment we stop educating/teaching.
> 
> 
> J. B. Rainsberger,

Kind regards, Stefan Steurs.


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