Empiricism

I’m a strong proponent of empiricism. While I’ve certainly had a prediliction for a while, this has been particulaly bolstered in recent times when misinformation is rife and critical thought seems to be often foresaken for meme virality.

In Software

From a Fred Brooks essay I’ve also more recently come to appreciate the difference between empiricism and rationalism, where I’ve seen the latter applied to effectively squash evolution.

Within the context of computer software there is likely a synergy between empiricism and worse is better (whereas The Right Thing tends more towards rationalism), as Worse is Better lends itself more to pursuing more quantifiable, practical indicators and earlier surfacing of the relevant data (all of which also fits in with many agile principles.