Question: is there any reason to use the words “decoupling” rather than “coupling”? It seems to me that “low decoupling” is logically equivalent to “high coupling” and “high decoupling” is logically equivalent to low coupling. So in the spirit of simplification, would it not be better to state the distinction as being between “high coupling” people and “low coupling”?
To me, (1) “coupling” suggests specifically joining in pairs much more strongly than “decoupling” suggests specifically detaching pairs and (2) “coupling” suggests that the default state of the things is disconnection, whereas “decoupling” suggests that the default state is connection.
The usual scenario here is that (1) you have lots of things that all relate to one another, and that (2a) most people find it difficult to disentangle, or disapprove of disentangling, and that (2b) all really truly are connected to one another, so that considering them in isolation is a sometimes useful and effective cognitive trick rather than any sort of default.
For all those reasons I think “decoupling” is a better term than “coupling” here. (I also like the opposition decoupling/contextualizing, as found in some of the earlier things Nernst links to, rather than more-decoupling/less-decoupling. When faced with a pile of interrelated things, sometimes you want to decouple them and sometimes you want to pay special attention to the interrelations. It’s not as simple as there being some people who are good at decoupling and some who aren’t. Though of course most people are bad at decoupling and bad at contextualizing...)
I definitely think Nerst has things the right way round, but I’m having trouble making explcit why. One reason though that I can make explicit is that, well, tangling everything together is the default. Decoupling—orthogonality, unbundling, separation of concerns, hugging the query—is rarer, takes work, and is worth pointing out.
Question: is there any reason to use the words “decoupling” rather than “coupling”? It seems to me that “low decoupling” is logically equivalent to “high coupling” and “high decoupling” is logically equivalent to low coupling. So in the spirit of simplification, would it not be better to state the distinction as being between “high coupling” people and “low coupling”?
To me, (1) “coupling” suggests specifically joining in pairs much more strongly than “decoupling” suggests specifically detaching pairs and (2) “coupling” suggests that the default state of the things is disconnection, whereas “decoupling” suggests that the default state is connection.
The usual scenario here is that (1) you have lots of things that all relate to one another, and that (2a) most people find it difficult to disentangle, or disapprove of disentangling, and that (2b) all really truly are connected to one another, so that considering them in isolation is a sometimes useful and effective cognitive trick rather than any sort of default.
For all those reasons I think “decoupling” is a better term than “coupling” here. (I also like the opposition decoupling/contextualizing, as found in some of the earlier things Nernst links to, rather than more-decoupling/less-decoupling. When faced with a pile of interrelated things, sometimes you want to decouple them and sometimes you want to pay special attention to the interrelations. It’s not as simple as there being some people who are good at decoupling and some who aren’t. Though of course most people are bad at decoupling and bad at contextualizing...)
Actually, I like Decoupling vs. Contextualising more too, especially as they become single words.
Yeah I like those quite a bit more, actually (I actually thinking using them in the conversations on this post would make them easier to follow)
I definitely think Nerst has things the right way round, but I’m having trouble making explcit why. One reason though that I can make explicit is that, well, tangling everything together is the default. Decoupling—orthogonality, unbundling, separation of concerns, hugging the query—is rarer, takes work, and is worth pointing out.