They could have a valid debate about budgets (both dev and runtime costs) and precision-recall tradeoffs, and whether the problem is simple enough that it’s anywhere close to true that the rules will fit in someone’s head in order to be testable and debuggable.
I’m not sure what “it’s anywhere close to true that the rules will fit in someone’s head in order to be testable and debuggable” means. I guess you just mean if the problem is simple enough then the rule-based approach is better. Is that correct?
I’ll assuming yes here. While Bob indeed doesn’t mention explicitly about budgets, I guess we can all assume that everyone wants budgets as low as possible. And since Bob thinks that since the context is small here, I think he thinks that the problem is simple enough, and if using the rule-based approach then the precision-recall tradeoffs won’t bee applied here. Overall, I think that in his mind the rule-based approach is the perfect tool for the problem.
They can talk about what parts of the problem are best addressed by what tools. But a general discussion of “if we have only one tool, should it be a hammer or a screwdriver” is probably unhelpful.
So while I really agree with this, I suppose the reason both sides stuck is because both assume that their tool has superiority over the other on the problem. Alice sees the problem and concludes that this must be a nail and can never be a screw, so obviously the screwdriver is bad. Bob sees the problem and concludes that this must be a screw and can never be a nail, so obviously the hammer is bad.
So I guess instead of arguing whether the solution should be a screwdriver or a hammer, they should argue on whether the problem is a screw or a nail. Perhaps it’s a combination of screw and nail. Bob does give more detail about the problem when he says “the context is small”, and I guess in his mind it’s a distinctive feature of a screw, but perhaps the reality is that it’s a shared feature of both. He sees the shank and mistakes it with the helical thread.
I’m not sure what “it’s anywhere close to true that the rules will fit in someone’s head in order to be testable and debuggable” means. I guess you just mean if the problem is simple enough then the rule-based approach is better. Is that correct?
I’ll assuming yes here. While Bob indeed doesn’t mention explicitly about budgets, I guess we can all assume that everyone wants budgets as low as possible. And since Bob thinks that since the context is small here, I think he thinks that the problem is simple enough, and if using the rule-based approach then the precision-recall tradeoffs won’t bee applied here. Overall, I think that in his mind the rule-based approach is the perfect tool for the problem.
So while I really agree with this, I suppose the reason both sides stuck is because both assume that their tool has superiority over the other on the problem. Alice sees the problem and concludes that this must be a nail and can never be a screw, so obviously the screwdriver is bad. Bob sees the problem and concludes that this must be a screw and can never be a nail, so obviously the hammer is bad.
So I guess instead of arguing whether the solution should be a screwdriver or a hammer, they should argue on whether the problem is a screw or a nail. Perhaps it’s a combination of screw and nail. Bob does give more detail about the problem when he says “the context is small”, and I guess in his mind it’s a distinctive feature of a screw, but perhaps the reality is that it’s a shared feature of both. He sees the shank and mistakes it with the helical thread.
I hope this make sense.