There is a joke about programmers, that I picked up long ago, I don’t remember where, that says: A good programmer will do hours of work to automate away minutes of drudgery. Some time last month, that joke came into my head, and I thought: yes of course, a programmer should do that, since most of the hours spent automating are building capital, not necessarily in direct drudgery-prevention but in learning how to automate in this domain.
I did not think of this post, when I had that thought. But I also don’t think I would’ve noticed, if that joke had crossed my mind two years ago. This, I think, is what a good concept-crystallization feels like: an application arises, and it simply feels like common sense, as you have forgotten that there was ever a version of you which would not have noticed that.
There is a joke about programmers, that I picked up long ago, I don’t remember where, that says: A good programmer will do hours of work to automate away minutes of drudgery. Some time last month, that joke came into my head, and I thought: yes of course, a programmer should do that, since most of the hours spent automating are building capital, not necessarily in direct drudgery-prevention but in learning how to automate in this domain.
I did not think of this post, when I had that thought. But I also don’t think I would’ve noticed, if that joke had crossed my mind two years ago. This, I think, is what a good concept-crystallization feels like: an application arises, and it simply feels like common sense, as you have forgotten that there was ever a version of you which would not have noticed that.