The article glorifies neurodiversity as an wanted trait, which is perfectly suited to build perfect software. There are no downsides, you just have to sooth neurodivergent people somehow with some dim cozy lighting and silence.
I wish some programmers would be more stubborn exploring a problem space. But being randomly obsessed about a detail can also be a distraction. Loosing track of time during an obsessed phase isn't always helpful. All this is also often a easy way to ignore responsibilities of life.
I suggest that all nerodivergent peers go on high alert if they encounter business people and wanna be hustlers that pretend to care.
I've met neurodivergent people who couldn't even stay on track long enough to prepare a regular dinner. Strong "neurogenetic executive failure" is a common trait. It's nowhere near as black and white as the article wants to make it out to be.
This piece is wildly unfair to folks with neuro-divergence - all get lumped into one bucket. Everything suggested is either a "works-for-me" assertion, from a sample size of 1, or a broad generalization about typical neuro-divergent individuals - and that seems like a contradiction in terms. Let's be fair here.
> There was a particular button on the user interface that bugged him. It bugged him because it was a slightly different shade of green in the screenshots than it was in the staging environment. The team looked into it, and sure enough, we had tested a slightly older version of the software, not the exact version we nearly shipped to the customer. He saw and noticed the button but what would have been deployed would have had multiple bugs in the code that weren’t visible and passing because the tests were on the old version too. That’s bottom-up thinking.
It doesn't talk about neurodivergent people, but about non-brain damaged people, whose brains can still do dimensionality reduction, which allows them to deal with problems efficiently.
The so called neurotypical people are people brain damaged from something, who slowly took over the society over the 20th century. Without dimensionality reduction, virtually everything they encounter is an overwhelming, highly dimemsional problem so they can't deal with anything, except for a narrow set of problems they specifically trained to deal with.
So before I dig hard here, I want to say that I respect Dr. Simmons. He struggles with autism and built the wonderful autism simulator[0] to communicate his experience.
That said, I have lived with manic depression for the better part of my career, and I find this incredibly insulting.
(1) Neurodivergence by definition involves broad difference. Its irresponsible to declare anything absolute and categorical about such a "divergent" population. Many of these divergences are bonafide pathologies that need attention. Even many non-"pathological" quirks, deserve the attention for the sake of healthy dynamics with others.
(2) Lot's of the behaviors promoted can cause people to fail dramatically. I have both lost my job and been kicked out of school for precisely the behaviors described. Obsession, rigidity, and impatience are recipes for disaster especially in combination.
(3) The absence of humility in the article is remarkable. I actively work on self-improvement and strive to remain unnoticed. I work to foster healthy dynamics with my coworkers and those I love. While I do appreciate accommodations, I do not expect the world to adapt to me, and I am always open to feedback for growth. I choose to remain hidden because of the attitudes expressed. I want people to associate me with others who are so boldly unapologetic about their shortcomings.
Yes recognizing strengths is important, but it's equally important to know when you're getting high on your own supply.
I wish people would stop talking so much about neurodivergency in this way. I think we just need to be aware of the differences, to help neurodivergent people where they need help, to adapt to what needs adaptation, and to give them the space they require, as is true to all human beings.
Talking about neurodivengency as a general advantage (or disadvantage) brings no benefit and adds nothing but noise to the discussion.
I agree a rounded view is needed. I just happen to find a lot of discussion online as well as irl to be very demotivating (sometimes bordering on a pitty party, especially on some subreddits), which is why I posted this. Ofc not expecting this to be a "well rounded" analysis - it's a very specific look they wrote about.
I’m actually neurodivergent. It’s not much of a gift, let me tell you. I fully count on my neurotypical teammates to ensure the company doesn’t go off the rails. If it were just me, cool stuff would definitely happen - randomly. And we would run out of money and fail.
This sounds like my kind of hell. I actively enjoy going to work in a busy office and the primary reason to do so is to chat to my coworkers.
I literally cannot work in silence. The best place I ever worked was at one CCC congress where someone had set up a bunch of desks in the corner of one of the raves.
What even is the point of going in to the office if you're going to sit in silent ranks trying to increase shareholder value as much as possible without any breaks or distractions? Eugh.
Bonus: by the way "Trait 2" is written I know for sure that the author has never experienced real hyperfocus. True hyperfocus is something to be avoided at all costs. Writing code for 6 hours straight is a terrible experience and leaves you drained, physically uncomfortable and sometimes mildly injured if you were in a bad posture during that time.
> A former manager once described me as a “purist”.
Can we talk for a second about how useless this type of language is? When people repeat phrases like "don't let perfection be the enemy of 'good enough'" and such?
The problem is they're used predominantly as thought terminating cliches. Perfection doesn't exist and frankly if someone thinks it does it really suggests they're very junior. The problem with those phrases is that they sidestep the needed conversation of "what is good enough" and instead implicitly state "what I think is good enough is the answer and what you think is unreasonable". It kills the needed conversation and just annoys the person you're saying it too.
Working in teams is all about communication and we often do a really poor job at it. Let's be honest, the soft skills matter. Just say something different like "why are those features needed?" or "what's wrong with the current implementation?" and follow up with "how critical are these issues?" You can always triage and come back. Maybe there's something you don't see and the "perfectionist" does because they're in the weeds. Maybe there's a disagreement on the specs. Maybe the "perfection" is useful but low priority given current conditions so you log up a feature request or make some note and move on, coming back later.
It's just a pet peeve of mine, as someone who's heard this a lot. Sometimes it is me, but more often than not it is the person not working on the thing that is missing the scope of the problem (almost always when a manager is nontechnical or disconnected). A simple conversation usually clears that all up and every party tends to move their position a bit.
But many people do let perfect be the enemy of the good.
Sometimes they're even right.
If you think we shouldn't push a quick & dirty fix for this issue that's affecting 20% of your users, because a good fix will take much more time, but also take care of an entire class of bugs that are otherwise likely to crop up...
That's letting perfect be the enemy of the good.
And there's no way to know, just from that scenario, which side is really correct. Maybe the bug will cost your company $1 million/hour until it's fixed. Maybe letting the quick & dirty fix go in means that you'll annoy users enough that you'll lose 10% of them permanently.
I disagree with most of the article, but your response to that quote is quite a lot. "Purist" doesn't say much without context, but you imply perfection and to a wider degree excessive escalation of not-good-enough. I don't read that at all from it.
I also see the other side quite a lot. People read tickets half assed, quickly write some code and move on. Their first thought is good enough. Which is usually not.
That mindset was born in the VC startup world. Of course it makes sense to shorten the time of burning money and bringing new features to beat the competition. But that doesn't makes it always justified. The tech world has more and more visible problems with security and quality. Good enough plays a part in it.
I think articles like this need the pre-amble/framing of accommodations given to neurodivergent individuals come with benefits that are not, otherwise, intuitive to those without that 'flavour' of neurodivregance.
I've grown to dislike the term "neurodivergent". People seem to think of it as equivalent to "neurodiverse", which is a valid and useful term, but it is totally different, and problematic. The difference is that a population is "diverse" whereas an individual is "divergent".
To discuss the "neurodiversity" of a population is to recognise the enormous range of different aptitudes and ways of being across that group. It's an inclusive way of thinking and matches reality as I see it.
To describe an individual as "neurodivergent" is to imply a "normal" group from which that individual "diverges". It usually also implies a second "divergent" group to which they belong.
It's related to the "condition-isation" we also get in language, where you don't simply think a particular way but "have something". I don't merely struggle to imagine visual imagery, I "have aphantasia". I don't merely get annoyed by small, repetitive noises, I "have misophonia".
As a child, I was diagnosed with Tourette's Syndrome. I mostly grew out of it in my twenties, but I still 'tic noticeably at times. Back then my 'tics were severe, sometimes extreme, and could be disruptive in lessons. (But no, while I did have vocal 'tics I did not "have coprolalia". Only around 10% of Tourette's "sufferers" swear compulsively, not that you'd think so based on the way it's portrayed in the media.)
To have a label attached to this "condition" helped in some ways: a particular teacher who was visibly annoyed by my vocalisations was more tolerant knowing I "had a condition" that caused them (although perhaps he himself should have been given dispensation as someone who "had misophonia"); drugs and therapy were tried, which didn't help but could have done.
However neither I nor my peers ever saw me as different to them, and these benefits could have accrued just as well without the label. Indeed, I've known plenty of people without the diagnosis who would have benefitted at least from a greater understanding that some of their behaviours are compulsive and difficult to manage.
Grouping symptoms into syndromes surely has some value in medical research, but a neurological syndrome like Tourette's or OCD or autism isn't like a hepatitis infection. The underlying mechanism isn't understood and the symptoms are things that are seen to a greater or lesser extent throughout the population. Drawing a sharp distinction between those who "have a condition" and those who "are normal" seems counterproductive.
The more "diverse" a population is, the less it makes sense to think of any individual within it as "divergent", and real-world human populations are incredibly neurodiverse.
Arggggh. This just after Russell Barkley finally decides that his post-retirement Youtube career is over. Seriously people just go learn from those who dedicated their life to the subject, don't waste time you cannot afford not to learn, no matter how neuro-divergent you think you are or aren't.
25 comments
[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 49.8 ms ] threadI wish some programmers would be more stubborn exploring a problem space. But being randomly obsessed about a detail can also be a distraction. Loosing track of time during an obsessed phase isn't always helpful. All this is also often a easy way to ignore responsibilities of life.
I suggest that all nerodivergent peers go on high alert if they encounter business people and wanna be hustlers that pretend to care.
No, that's spotting a problem. Like, come on.
The so called neurotypical people are people brain damaged from something, who slowly took over the society over the 20th century. Without dimensionality reduction, virtually everything they encounter is an overwhelming, highly dimemsional problem so they can't deal with anything, except for a narrow set of problems they specifically trained to deal with.
That said, I have lived with manic depression for the better part of my career, and I find this incredibly insulting.
(1) Neurodivergence by definition involves broad difference. Its irresponsible to declare anything absolute and categorical about such a "divergent" population. Many of these divergences are bonafide pathologies that need attention. Even many non-"pathological" quirks, deserve the attention for the sake of healthy dynamics with others.
(2) Lot's of the behaviors promoted can cause people to fail dramatically. I have both lost my job and been kicked out of school for precisely the behaviors described. Obsession, rigidity, and impatience are recipes for disaster especially in combination.
(3) The absence of humility in the article is remarkable. I actively work on self-improvement and strive to remain unnoticed. I work to foster healthy dynamics with my coworkers and those I love. While I do appreciate accommodations, I do not expect the world to adapt to me, and I am always open to feedback for growth. I choose to remain hidden because of the attitudes expressed. I want people to associate me with others who are so boldly unapologetic about their shortcomings.
Yes recognizing strengths is important, but it's equally important to know when you're getting high on your own supply.
[0]: https://autism-simulator.vercel.app
Talking about neurodivengency as a general advantage (or disadvantage) brings no benefit and adds nothing but noise to the discussion.
I literally cannot work in silence. The best place I ever worked was at one CCC congress where someone had set up a bunch of desks in the corner of one of the raves.
What even is the point of going in to the office if you're going to sit in silent ranks trying to increase shareholder value as much as possible without any breaks or distractions? Eugh.
Bonus: by the way "Trait 2" is written I know for sure that the author has never experienced real hyperfocus. True hyperfocus is something to be avoided at all costs. Writing code for 6 hours straight is a terrible experience and leaves you drained, physically uncomfortable and sometimes mildly injured if you were in a bad posture during that time.
The problem is they're used predominantly as thought terminating cliches. Perfection doesn't exist and frankly if someone thinks it does it really suggests they're very junior. The problem with those phrases is that they sidestep the needed conversation of "what is good enough" and instead implicitly state "what I think is good enough is the answer and what you think is unreasonable". It kills the needed conversation and just annoys the person you're saying it too.
Working in teams is all about communication and we often do a really poor job at it. Let's be honest, the soft skills matter. Just say something different like "why are those features needed?" or "what's wrong with the current implementation?" and follow up with "how critical are these issues?" You can always triage and come back. Maybe there's something you don't see and the "perfectionist" does because they're in the weeds. Maybe there's a disagreement on the specs. Maybe the "perfection" is useful but low priority given current conditions so you log up a feature request or make some note and move on, coming back later.
It's just a pet peeve of mine, as someone who's heard this a lot. Sometimes it is me, but more often than not it is the person not working on the thing that is missing the scope of the problem (almost always when a manager is nontechnical or disconnected). A simple conversation usually clears that all up and every party tends to move their position a bit.
Sometimes they're even right.
If you think we shouldn't push a quick & dirty fix for this issue that's affecting 20% of your users, because a good fix will take much more time, but also take care of an entire class of bugs that are otherwise likely to crop up...
That's letting perfect be the enemy of the good.
And there's no way to know, just from that scenario, which side is really correct. Maybe the bug will cost your company $1 million/hour until it's fixed. Maybe letting the quick & dirty fix go in means that you'll annoy users enough that you'll lose 10% of them permanently.
I also see the other side quite a lot. People read tickets half assed, quickly write some code and move on. Their first thought is good enough. Which is usually not.
That mindset was born in the VC startup world. Of course it makes sense to shorten the time of burning money and bringing new features to beat the competition. But that doesn't makes it always justified. The tech world has more and more visible problems with security and quality. Good enough plays a part in it.
To discuss the "neurodiversity" of a population is to recognise the enormous range of different aptitudes and ways of being across that group. It's an inclusive way of thinking and matches reality as I see it.
To describe an individual as "neurodivergent" is to imply a "normal" group from which that individual "diverges". It usually also implies a second "divergent" group to which they belong.
It's related to the "condition-isation" we also get in language, where you don't simply think a particular way but "have something". I don't merely struggle to imagine visual imagery, I "have aphantasia". I don't merely get annoyed by small, repetitive noises, I "have misophonia".
As a child, I was diagnosed with Tourette's Syndrome. I mostly grew out of it in my twenties, but I still 'tic noticeably at times. Back then my 'tics were severe, sometimes extreme, and could be disruptive in lessons. (But no, while I did have vocal 'tics I did not "have coprolalia". Only around 10% of Tourette's "sufferers" swear compulsively, not that you'd think so based on the way it's portrayed in the media.)
To have a label attached to this "condition" helped in some ways: a particular teacher who was visibly annoyed by my vocalisations was more tolerant knowing I "had a condition" that caused them (although perhaps he himself should have been given dispensation as someone who "had misophonia"); drugs and therapy were tried, which didn't help but could have done.
However neither I nor my peers ever saw me as different to them, and these benefits could have accrued just as well without the label. Indeed, I've known plenty of people without the diagnosis who would have benefitted at least from a greater understanding that some of their behaviours are compulsive and difficult to manage.
Grouping symptoms into syndromes surely has some value in medical research, but a neurological syndrome like Tourette's or OCD or autism isn't like a hepatitis infection. The underlying mechanism isn't understood and the symptoms are things that are seen to a greater or lesser extent throughout the population. Drawing a sharp distinction between those who "have a condition" and those who "are normal" seems counterproductive.
The more "diverse" a population is, the less it makes sense to think of any individual within it as "divergent", and real-world human populations are incredibly neurodiverse.
... that "normal" people can't understand or use. That's how you get things like this story of Tom, told by ThePrimeagen[1].
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwUPs5N9I6I