
Are you a technical person? - johnfn
http://johnfn.github.com/johnfn/post1.html
======
aik
"What restrictions have others placed on you?"

Among other things, I have come to the realization that the way that our
schools are structured (in the US anyway) promotes this type of thinking
you're talking about.

There's a reinforcing feedback loop taking place:

1\. You have no natural interest in (say) algebra, possibly due to lack of
knowledge about what it is and what it is for. This is never explained to you
in a way that makes sense to you.

2\. You don't spend time thinking about algebra, and neither does your
subconscious.

3\. You do your homework, but don't care much, and don't care to learn.
Because you don't care, you don't care to understand deeply. You're now stuck
learning in a shallow way, or, in other words, memorizing inert knowledge. The
knowledge is mostly unusable to you, and the homework and tests are structured
in such a way to allow shallow understanding to get by, so you're fine. You
mainly care to meet the expectations of the teacher (get a good grade and be
viewed favorably), so all is good.

5\. Because of the above, you mostly suck at tests, and mostly suck at meeting
the teacher's (and peer's) expectations. You suck compared to others in the
class.

6\. Because you don't fully understand the implications of what you're
learning, you continue not to care. Because you are sucking, you care even
less.

7\. See #1 with the same or other topics.

I'd recommend reading about Carol Dweck's Entity vs. Incremental Self-Theories
on Learning. Incredible stuff.

"The amount of skill that you have in a certain area is proportional to the
amount of work that you put into it."

Instead of using the word "work", I would say "proportional to the amount of
time you and your mind spends on it." One reason people are significantly and
seemingly naturally better at certain skills is because they are naturally
drawn to it. Things you are naturally drawn to you both consciously AND
subconsciously spend time on. In the past I've never spent much time
contemplating or trying to understand the intricacies of the stock market, and
neither has my mind, and I have never had much interest, and so I'm not a
particularly skilled stock broker.

~~~
Revisor
I second the recommendation of Mrs. Dweck's texts. Her book "Self-Theories..."
changed my life. Or at least reinforced the changes I was undergoing then:

The right strategy and appropriate effort are much more important than
results.

------
idan
As a developer/designer, I spend a lot of time getting this _exact_ message
across to developers who "don't do design" and designers who are afraid of
code. I've given that same schpiel many times before -- in almost the exact
same words ("false dichotomy", "labels", "we can be skilled at anything we
dedicate ourselves to").

Can't upvote this enough.

~~~
archgoon
Can you recommend any books (or projects) that would be good references for
learning design?

~~~
gallerytungsten
What kind of design do you want to learn?

If you're just starting out, you have to break it down a bit into some of the
component parts. Typography, composition, color. Print design is different
than web design. 3d design is another thing entirely; and so on.

Let's say the goal is print design. Get hold of a layout program, such as
Quark, InDesign, or Illustrator. Start by doing basic things like business
cards and letterhead. Work on just the type first. Use only 1 font at first;
then different weights of the same typeface. Then start trying to add in drawn
elements or even just geometric shapes.

Remember: if it doesn't work in black & white, it won't work in color. When
you are ready for color, keep in mind that the 3 strongest colors in design
are black, white, and red. Black and red are the easier of the three; so put
extra attention into the use of white (negative space).

~~~
usaar333
Unfortunately, you've really jumped the gun here.

I'm a programmer who isn't so hot with design. But I certainly know how to use
a program to layout objects; that's trivial to learn on the grand scheme of
things.

What I (and other non-designing devs) don't get is how to know what "doesn't
work". I have at most a fuzzy idea of what are considered good and bad
designs, much less how to produce them.

One of the biggest issues is the lack of feedback. With beginning programming,
you are getting constant feedback from the computer. It even tells you where
you are going wrong (line numbers, variables, etc.)

Design lacks such an objective feedback system. Sure, there's the times when
your friends will agree that iteration B is superior to A. But actually
getting feedback on what to do next? Pretty tough.

~~~
gallerytungsten
Time to learn the term "design brief," which relates to the design like a
program specification relates to the program.

What is the design supposed to accomplish? What should it convey? What kind of
reaction should it elicit from the viewer? While these ideas may not be
completely objective, they can be expressed in written form. Doing so is one
way to bring some objectivity into the the process, as well as a way of
keeping everyone "on the same page." Adhering to the spec is a also a good way
of finding out if your spec is useful or not. If you find the design veering
away from the brief, go back to the beginning and start again; re-write your
brief, and re-iterate the design.

Now a quibble about your mention of knowing how to use a program to lay out
objects. (Note, "lay out" is the verb and "layout" is the noun.) One such
"object" is of course type, and learning how to size, lead, track and kern
your type is more than just placing objects (letters) in proximity. Knowing
how to use the program is one thing; achieving great visual results is
another.

How to learn what works and what doesn't? Get some design annuals, subscribe
to design magazines, start reading design blogs. Most importantly, find a good
designer who will critique your work. All of these activities will develop
your eye and your design sense.

------
dtran
Joe Kraus once said in a talk that companies, especially startups, need to
triple down on what they're good at rather than focusing on all their
weaknesses - that's really the only way a startup can win since it can't be
better than a big company at a lot of things, but it can be head and shoulders
better at just one thing. I'm not sure how this applies to people, especially
since balanced people can bring a fresh perspective to things (i.e. a
programmer with some creative background might approach a problem in new and
interesting ways).

Without arguing the efficacy of the TigerMom approach, this is indeed why a
lot of parents force their kids to do something - you may not have a knack for
it at first and be tempted to write off that it just isn't for you, but you
need to put in a little more time to really figure out what your true learning
curve for something looks like.

One interesting question is whether you really love doing something or just
love doing it because you had a knack for it initially and picked it up
quickly (which results in a positive feedback loop: you spend more time on it
and get even better at it compared to the things that you didn't have a knack
for at first). I think college really hammered that home for me - before, I
just really liked a lot of math of science because it seemed to come
naturally, but to find what you really love doing, you have to hit the wall
and see if you enjoy it when it becomes a struggle.

------
cek
I don't disagree regarding the dichotomy between Technical/Creative per the
article. I also subscribe to Heinlein's "Specialization is for Insects" truism
(below).

However, one of the best pieces of advice I ever got from one of my favorite
mentors (Bob Muglia) was to never take a job where you have to do something
you know you are not good at.

I have always sucked at detailed-status-list tracking. I eventually figured
out how to compliment myself with others who could do it. However, at one
point in my career when I was looking at new opportunities I saw one that
would have forced me to get good a being very detail oriented. When I showed
Bob my potential job options and asked for his advice he told me "Don't take
the detail job. You will suck at it and you will hate it. You have other
super-powers that are valuable and you should focus on finding jobs where you
can apply those."

You CAN do anything, and you SHOULD try everything. But in the end, you'll be
most successful if you focus on what you know you are great at.

\----- "A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion,
butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance
accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give
orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch
manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die
gallantly. Specialization is for insects". -Robert A. Heinlein

------
memset
To me, this is consistent with Paul Graham's essay "Keep Your Identity Small."
If I have strongly identified myself as a "technical person" then I have
excluded myself from the possibility of becoming conversant in non-tech
things, like good graphic design. Because I'm just a techie!

Then this got me thinking about footnote #2 in the essay - that perhaps it is
a net win to call oneself a scientist, which implies that one is not committed
to any belief in particular. I was pretty pleased when I read this; "great,
I'm a scientist, I must be pretty open-minded!" Easy.

Except that - and this article seems to highlight the point - if you box
yourself into being a "scientist" (I will suggest that many of us techies
consider ourselves scientists, or at least science-minded) then you run the
risk of excluding yourself from non-science things. Things like graphic
design. (or marketing, accounting, or musicianship.)

So. I am not a scientist! Not a techie. Not a designer. I am a person who is
pretty (darn) good at technology and still has a lot of difficult things, like
graphic design, to practice and get better at!

~~~
robrenaud
This is interesting, but I disagree. It's certainly possible to be able to
engage in rational discussion about things related to ones own identity.

I am a programmer, and primarily I identify as a C++ and Python programmer.
Compared to other languages, for a given problem (unless it's truly massive,
where the efficiency/expressiveness gain over the other two is large to offset
becoming an expert in it), I am almost certainly going to provide an adequate
solution quickest in one of those languages.

But if you say that Python is slow, doesn't do concurrency well, or has
trouble scaling to truly large, 100+ programmer codebases, I'll agree with
you.

And if you call C++ a large, ugly, language with a ton of ways to really screw
yourself, and that is tied to a slow edit/compile/debug cycle, I'll agree with
you there too.

Here perhaps maybe enlarging my identity helped, if I was just a Python
programmer, I wouldn't see how static typing and a really good code searching
system would help getting an anchor on a large, complicated C++ code base.
Those static types and non-virtual functions means that yes, I can see every
place that this particular function is called in our entire code base without
having to dig all that much. And if I was just a C++ programmer, I wouldn't
know the bliss that is hacking a 200 line program in Python, and solving some
mildy complicated but mostly self contained problem in few hour session, all
without the bondage of makefiles, compiles, static typing and seg faults.

------
ricefield
This is very interesting to me, as a computer science student, who does
"techie" things like code a take a lot of technical classes, yet always been
considered (or considered myself) a "artistic" person.

When I was younger, my best subjects were Art and English, and my worst
subject was always Math. This had continued to be true, as I consider myself
much better at design than at coding or problem solving. I wouldn't say the
dichotomy is necessarily true or false - I hate to think we are stuck as one
or the other, and I certainly know people who are talented at both.

On the other hand, in my observation, there always seems to be an inherent
aptitude - I struggle and work a lot harder with "technical" things; but it
can be overcome - I am still a CS student at top university, and am not a
phenomenal coder, but I can keep up. For so-called "technical" people, you may
or may not believe in the dichotomy, but that doesn't mean hard work can't
make you better at "creative" work than "talented" others.

------
rokhayakebe
Edit: Imagine what would happen to the industry if you changed titles from
software engineers to software artists.

I long the day when software engineers start looking at themselves as artists.
Take this from someone who isn't an engineer. You take your ideas and turn
them into something others can interact with, play with, control, morph, do
other freaking cool things with and sometimes they even get a feeling/emotion
out of it. That's f _& &_ing art to me.

~~~
rfrey
That prompts an interesting (to me) idea: software as social commentary.
Anyone have any examples of that?

~~~
Xurinos
Do you mean like online interactive games?

I do not know if this is what you were looking for, but I have seen some
interesting behaviors arise depending on how the system is set up in Dark
Mists. Usually it has to do with where the rewards/incentives lie, such that
behavior can be guided towards it, and it is always a new lesson in humility
when unexpected incentives appear.

Yet in other ways, there is the outside-game community with its rules and
ethics. Here is a specific example: Players are concerned about gangs of other
players logging in and coordinating because they want to believe they play a
game in which the coordination is completely in-character... a sign of the
work we have put into the game to focus it on role-playing.

When designing an RPG (stress on the role-playing part), I have learned that
it is not just about the game mechanics and features. It is also about
building the community, the mini-society.

------
robobenjie
I recommend pointing people to this excellent comic: [http://www.smbc-
comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=1995#c...](http://www.smbc-
comics.com/index.php?db=comics&id=1995#comic)

------
happyfeet
One article in today's blog of 37signals.com/svn resonates very much with the
message.

[http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2919-ten-design-lessons-
from-...](http://37signals.com/svn/posts/2919-ten-design-lessons-from-
frederick-law-olmsted-the-father-of-american-landscape-architecture#extended)

Here is an excerpt: ================= Olmsted had no formal design training
and didn’t commit to landscape architecture until he was 44. Before that, he
was a New York Times correspondent to the Confederate states, the manager of a
California gold mine, and General Secretary of the United States Sanitary
Commission during the Civil War. He also ran a farm on Staten Island from 1848
to 1855 and spent time working in a New York dry-goods store.

His views on landscapes developed from travelling and reading. When he was
young, he took a year-long voyage in China. And in 1850, he took a six-month
walking tour of Europe and the British Isles, during which he saw numerous
parks, private estates, and scenic countryside. He was also deeply influenced
by Swiss physician Johann Georg von Zimmermann’s writings about nature’s
ability to heal “derangements of the mind” through imagination. Olmsted read
Zimmermann’s book as a boy and treasured it. =======================

------
j_baker
_What restrictions have others placed on you?_

This is what happens when you identify with your chosen profession too
closely. Psychologists refer to it as a persona:
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persona_(psychology)>

It's tempting to believe that others have placed these kinds of restrictions
on you, but the truth of the matter is that we put these restrictions on
ourselves. That's the truly important discovery: you have control over the
mask you wear (albeit not unlimited control).

------
fbnt
"I make sofware, it's one of the few art forms that really pays off nowadays"

This is my usual line when somebody ask me what I do for a living.

Still, I can see in many people's eyes (especially girls) a spark of
prejudice: ( IT Guy = pragmatic, heartless, frustrated, framed boring nerd )

------
dasil003
The irony of the supposed dichotomy of creative/technical is that both art and
programming are incredibly creative fields where one must synthesize with very
limited constraints. It is very difficult to excel at either without passion
and dedication.

------
tritogeneia
I think this is more a matter of transferability. If you're good at one
quantitative or technical skill, it's not so hard to learn another, and you
can do it pretty quickly. Teaching yourself to become an artist is a bigger
gap. I can appreciate design (although I never studied it formally) but I can
recognize that it may be more efficient to get someone else to do it for me.
The optimal degree of specialization isn't always "none."

------
dkarl
_The amount of skill that you have in a certain area is proportional to the
amount of work that you put into it.... This realization changed my life._

Heh, this realization does change your life... very, very slowly. Catching up
on all those hours invested is hard. Making them pass pleasantly is also a
challenge. Spending all day and half the night doing something is easy when
it's a source of pride and your refuge from all the stuff you _aren't_ good
at.

I spent years aspiring to be good at music. I took piano lessons for years as
a kid, even after my parents told me I could stop. I played saxophone in
junior high orchestra band and junior high jazz band. I wised up in high
school, but then in college I wasted a few hundred bucks on a guitar. I sold
it after a month, but then later I started going to the music building several
times a week to play the Hanon piano exercises. I actually kept it up for
several months before I stopped. No real music, just Hanon.

Music was a waste of time for me because I absolutely hated it. There was the
generic pleasure of improving at a skill, but that was the sum total of the
pleasure I derived from it. My entire goal in learning music, from the time I
was a child until I wasted that fifty or so hours in college, was to play
music that I liked hearing and that other people would like hearing. Of
course, I was so far from that.... I remember as a child being conscious that
my older sister's playing bugged the crap out of me. The mistakes, the awkward
tempos. And she was much better than me, five years ahead and also better for
her age than I was. The entire payoff for playing music was always _years_
away, even assuming I suddenly became extremely dedicated. Every hour between
me and my goal would be me enduring the misery of producing noises that I
disliked and was ashamed of. I thought that was just the way it was. I
flagellated myself for not being disciplined and far-sighted enough to pursue
that distant dream like so many other people did. I knew some kids just
enjoyed making bad music, but I didn't think they were the ones who would be
good at music someday. I just thought they had horrible taste. The ones who
were actually good had clearly been tougher than me; they had fought through
all the shame and humiliation of playing badly. They were fierce and ruthless
with themselves, and finally, after thousands of hours of hardship, they were
able to enjoy the fruits of their labor.

Nowadays I know that's not how it works. I'm more realistic with myself. I
could be a great dancer before I'm forty, except that I don't really like
dancing. I could be decent at drawing, except that I don't really like to
draw. Every couple of weeks I get a great idea for a cartoon and wish I could
draw it, but I really don't want to sketch crummy cartoons every day so I'll
be ready when I get a good idea. Programming, though.... Fire up gdb and look
at a core dump? Why the heck not? Install a new library and play around with
it? Fun! Read through some code, figure out how it works, and be on the
lookout for a memory leak? Ooh, kind of exciting, I might be the one who finds
it.

Those aren't especially stimulating activities, and there's no glamor in them.
They're nothing I could brag about to my friends or show off to a cute girl.
(I'm working on HTML and CSS now to fix that :-P) They're just something I
usually don't mind doing and often find pleasurable. I never chose to be good
at programming, and I actually took a pretty snobbish and dismissive attitude
towards it until I found myself making a living at it. (Looking down on it was
probably what enabled me to believe I could be good at it. Pfft, I can do
this, any idiot can do this, especially if he's half-autistic like me.)

I still get off on stupid tangents, though. I took a vacation several years
ago and was extremely frustrated with the performance of my point-and-click
digital camera. I ended up buying a DSLR, and suddenly I felt the pressure. I
had to become a good photographer. My friends were taking pictures and putting
them on Flickr (now on Facebook) and I had to keep up. I couldn't _suck_ at
taking pictures. Especially not after I bought the DSLR. I bought a crapload
of books and read at least a third of the ones I bought. I read on the web. I
took classes. I took my camera with me to places and took pictures instead of
having fun. The fact that I was taking shitty photos became a huge monkey on
my back. Still is, kind of. Last fall, I took an amazing trip to a place I'd
been wanting to go to for years, and I obsessed over the quality of the
pictures. When I got back I immediately looked through them and couldn't find
a single one I liked. For weeks I procrastinated processing them. Finally I
did. They sucked. It was awful. Now I don't even know if I should take my
camera with me on the next vacation I take.

So please, let me indulge in the misconception that I am just a "technical
type." That way I can take pictures in peace, without knowing that it is
really my fault and my shame if they suck, and that I should be putting in the
hard work so that one day I will be competent and my friends will not have to
endure my shitty photos. No, my shitty photos are not my fault. I am just not
a creative type. I am a techie. Leave me alone and stop reminding me that all
my artistic deficiencies are just one big character flaw!

~~~
potatolicious
From one photog to another:

\- _everyone_ sucks at taking pictures. The difference between a good
photographer and a bad one is largely how well they curate their work. Don't
go to the MOMA and get depressed because the walls are lined with incredible
works by incredible photographers - realize that it's an _incredibly_ selected
subset of everything they've done. After all, you're taking decades of a
career and choosing only the finest, oh, 50 photographs?

\- your keep rate shouldn't be much above 1%. 99% of the pictures you take
will be shit, and that's just the natural order of things. Throw these out -
preview them at home from the SD/CF card, and make sure none of them ever
survive to your HDD. Treat the remaining 1% carefully (back them up). Spend
time editing them and looking at them with a critical eye to see if they can
be better.

\- slow down, think more. New photographers mash the shutter release as if it
dispenses candy, particularly in the digital age. Put a jar on the kitchen
table at home - put a quarter into it for _every single picture you take_ (or
$0.50, or $1, depending on what is good for you). Donate this jar to charity
or something - the point here is to force you to take fewer pictures. You will
work harder for each one, and think more before each shot, and these will make
your work _dramatically_ better. Personally, I do this by shooting film. I
rarely leave home with more than 50 exposures or so in the camera/bag. On a
good day I'll shoot maybe 15 pictures.

\- go shooting more. What work inspires you? Ansel Adams? Winogrand? Cartier-
Bresson? Look at _lots_ of photographs and think about what makes them great
and what you like about them. Then go out and try to "see" the same images in
real life. A photographer's eye is far more important than their ability to
operate a DSLR.

\- join a critique group. Yes, this will suck for your ego, but it is
_extremely_ helpful for your development. Join a _small_ group (5-10 people
max) so it's not a complete zoo. These people will tell you _how_ to make your
pictures better and give you actual directionality in your improvement.

 _Lots_ of people in photography are hackers. If you're ever in Seattle, give
me a shout and we'll go shooting. Otherwise, keep snapping.

~~~
dkarl
Thanks for the suggestions. I'm not sure about the kitchen jar one since I
don't know if I take too many pictures or too few! My keep rate is higher than
1% because family and friends expect to see a few photos of the things I do.
On my last trip, I took about four hundred pictures and picked about twenty
for a quick slide show for friends. (That's a week's worth of pictures. Even
on a trip by myself I take less than a hundred a day.)

Can you suggest a place online for finding a critique group?

------
UrLicht
While I agree with the conclusion that you only get out of something what you
put in, a quick review of the history of genius will reveal several characters
that did have an innate talent that was indeed cultivated through hard work,
but was not learned "from scratch". You may, in fact, be the artistic type,
and glean from that a certain advantage over someone who is not.

------
radagaisus
We should act and do as though there are no limits to what we can do, but we
have to remember that nature & nurture do impose boundaries. We just don't
know what those boundaries are.

------
erikb
It feels like someone could learn some Zen here. Most things in life are not
of type boolean. It is true that these labels are a wrong concept in some way.
But of course the same applies to the idea, that everybody can do everything
in the same quality and quantity, just after spending the same time learning
it. It is too simple a point of view, isn't it?

Other than that I also get the feeling these days, that you can't be a good
coder without any ideas about design. To understand how we construct software
we all naturally learn the interface to processors, electronic waves and so
on. Why should learning about the human interface not be as important for
understanding how we should design our software. Also we all need to express
what we have in mind, which also needs some design abilities to create
appropriate ppts and prototypes.

------
udoprog
people need to stop attaching themselves to what they do, this way its easier
to both have fun just doing, no matter skill level or adherence. I've seen
bizarre cases of very skilled people tearing themselves up just because
whatever they do is not perfect in any given respect, be it technical or
artful. They end up miserable.

I don't design. I could, but I know that the time I would spend designing
would be twice the amount compared to a skilled designer. Instead I ask
someone who loves design. collaborate with them to create something awesome.
We bash and we chastise, but always realize that its about the work, not the
person or his/her skill level.

This does not translate well to corporate, but for the better it really
should.

------
niccl
This article perpetuates a dichotomy that I have only just (at 50+) realised
is false: creative versus technical. Technical people create: software and
hardware often come out of nothing more than an idea.

The real dichotomy that this article is getting at might be effectively
described as artistic versus non-artistic, but even that is not a complete
description of the distinction. Maybe it comes down to the old left-
brain/right-brain thing?

I used to call myself non-creative, until several good friends united to point
out that I do create things, just not things that you could plausibly turn up
in art galleries.

~~~
DrHankPym
Really? I thought it was about building skills by just applying yourself. You
don't learn guitar or Ruby in a night. You practice and play with them for
years and integrate them into your projects.

~~~
juiceandjuice
Knowing how to play guitar like a virtuoso != being artistic. Head on down to
Guitar Center to see what I mean.

~~~
Hawramani
I agree. If I made a robot that could follow musical notes and play the guitar
perfectly, would anyone describe its playing the guitar as 'creative'? I hope
not. This is a lab-like situation where we can know for sure that the robot is
using zero creativity to play the guitar. It is just following instructions,
it is not creating anything new.

However, if the robot could create new algorithms on the fly and could use
them to tweak the way it played the guitar for the better, then we could say
it is a creative robot.

Creative guitar players, like the second robot, invent new ways of playing a
particular piece of music, or just a few seconds of it, to induce specific
reactions in the listeners. This is creativity, and it seems to be rare not
common, possibly because of how difficult it is to master the notes, and then
to build rapport with the audience and manipulate their emotions.

~~~
geekzgalore
Learning something is not a creative process, but finding better ways at doing
it (after learning) makes you an artist. Same rule applies to learning
following skills: \- Music \- A programming language \- Cooking

------
gaustin
I've recently taken up hobby blacksmithing (focusing on blades). The skills
required were completely alien to me at first.

At this point, I can hardly make nails. But stretching myself in such a
dramatic way has really fueled my creativity, even when it comes to developing
software.

No matter how much I struggle, I know that in 20 years of systematically
pounding away on evenings and weekends, I'll have enough skill to make some
good stuff. I'm confident that I can become a ABS Journeyman, and perhaps a
Master if I live long enough.

------
Sukotto
I'm reminded of the wonderful (sadly now defunct) web comic "The Life of
Riley" in which this is a major, ongoing plot arc.

Starting here: <http://www.pyrocam.com/life-of-riley/comic.php?strip=25> and
continuing throughout the entire 600+ comics of the series. That particular
plot arc follows Dan, the artist, who unlocks his technical side, eventually
ascending to demigodhood by learning to leverage both types of creation.

If you want an amusing distraction, it's worth a read. (Also interesting to
see references to some of the other major web comics of the day... many of
which are now long gone.)

------
aero142
I got caught up in that sort of identity thinking about the time I was getting
out of high school but thankfully realized how wrong it was a few years ago. I
think that was probably one of the damaging ideas that ever got in my brain.

I'm not sure how much natural talent there is for various skills but I do know
that believing in natural talent is harmful.

~~~
orangecat
_I'm not sure how much natural talent there is for various skills but I do
know that believing in natural talent is harmful._

That sounds like the argument that you should believe in God because religious
people are happier. I don't see why the truth is harmful: you can get better
at just about anything with practice, and the degree to which that happens
varies with the individual and activity.

------
sayemm
_Hackers and Painters_ is a good answer to this. Is the person who wrote that
a "technical person"?

------
rokhayakebe
There is an artist in everyone. Everyone.

------
monological
Case in point: shawn inman

------
unwantedLetters
From Less Wrong: <http://lesswrong.com/lw/5a9/learned_blankness/>

------
marcusestes
If your blog is actually _served up in production_ by Github, yeah, you're a
technical person.

~~~
Miky
It seems that you didn't actually read the post. Your comment is only in
response to the title, and it's actually a good example of what the post was
trying to combat.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
Additionally, these sorts of clever one-liners are what HN comments shouldn't
be about.

------
juiceandjuice
I think there's a good reason why there's often a separation between creatives
and technical people, and this is it:

In order to be creative, or more specifically "artistic", you have to be
comfortable with the irrational. In fact, you truly need to be able to
appreciate the irrational.

Most technical people I've met (particularly engineers) can't make that jump,
and it's not easily taught or learned. By definition, there's often not really
a rational way to go about irrationality.

~~~
geraldalewis
Most art is most definitely rational, deliberate, and reasoned. It doesn't
appear so when you're thrown into the deep end (personally, although I'd been
exposed to it countless times, it took me a while to appreciate work like that
of Mondrian). Blocks of code look equally irrational to non-coders.

All the great Renaissance painters were as obsessed with math as they were
pigments. Their art is accessible, so probably appears rational. Modern art is
also rational, but understanding why it is rational sometimes means the viewer
needs an understanding of its history, or the artist's intentions.

Cubism is a great example of this: it might appear irrational for the artist
to paint a subject's eyes and their nose on the same plane, but it is not.
Cubism is a process in which multiple vantage points are presented at once.
Even though it is not a mechanical process dictated by strict rules, it is
indeed a process.

    
    
        while i
          --i
          subject.angle = random() * 360
          # copies a nose, eye, etc.
          feature = copy( subject.facial_features[ random() * 10 ] ) 
          paint( feature )
    

__Edit __: I'm afraid I didn't express myself clearly -- by `rational`, I
mean: reasoned, thought out, and deliberate.

~~~
mattgreenrocks
The output may seem rational, but was the process of synthesizing it 100%
rational? Can you write a program that creates the Mona Lisa while explaining
each decision along the way?

~~~
geraldalewis
The rationale for the decisions da Vinci made while painting the Mona Lisa are
actually pretty well documented <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mona_Lisa> .

~~~
mattgreenrocks
Yes, they are. I think we can agree that there is a beautiful elegance to it
that is similar to that of mathematics.

But that doesn't answer my question, which asked how to write a program that
was capable of outputting the Mona Lisa while rationalizing the decisions it
is making. Shouldn't we be able to feed everything we know about the Mona Lisa
into a program so it could generate something similar? If not, why not?

~~~
geraldalewis
I'd say that simply because something is rational doesn't mean it can be
codified into a computer program (yet). (Maybe my example code disrupted my
point more than helped.) The design of most computer programs is rational, but
a computer isn't sophisticated enough to program itself.

I'm actually having trouble thinking of an important human endeavor this was
_not_ in some way rational. Maybe some `Outsider Art` created by mental
patients? Programmers who work in `BrainFuck` or `LOLCODE`? I guess I'd only
think of something as irrational if I thought a reasonable person would not
come to a given conclusion based on the same inputs (such as knowledge, skill,
experience, etc).

