It has stuck in my head in different ways recently, this phrase:
Democrats are the party who want to says Yes, and Republicans are the party that wants to say No.
Of course, it's politics, and I think it was from an episode of West Wing, but it has a personal and local feel these days regarding engineering and technology. The difference between a positive outlook and a negative one, and how it shapes creativity.
Over the years I've found myself in the position (and I'm there again) where someone non-technical will present an idea, and then ask "can it be done?" I've been on the edge of the performance envelope and seen things go weirdly (technically) often enough that it's a real and legitimate question. But when on the edge, there's a lot of grey. When it's not a simple question, or topic, it can swing either way, and how it swings depends on how far you're willing to stretch into the unknown, or take a risk, or come up with something new. I mean, when you're in The Undiscovered Country, how do you really know one way or the other? Can you say for certain? No. It's a guess, a judgement. And thus comes the personal interpretation and where attitude features prominently. I'm recognizing, as I look at myself and my responses to such things, that I'm leaning negative.
But nothing is perfect. Especially when it's in development. Is the lack of a feature or property a stopper, or is it an opportunity to invent? Because it's not known doesn't mean it CAN'T be known, just that it isn't known right now. I've spent many an hour over the years banging on something to get it to work - struggling with limited tools, or understanding... and sometimes it was just that I didn't know it and it took time to get there, and sometimes I was on the edge of the envelope, and it would never work - I was just wasting my time.
To use more TV/movie analogies, there's the figures of characters like test pilots and astronauts... where the plane was built a certain way, and then they put it into the hands of the test pilot/cowboy who takes it and pushes it beyond where it was designed to go, and makes it happen regardless. The time when I played snooker for the first time with Bill (whatever his name is) and made this shot that I now know to be low probability, and when someone watching said "holy crap" and Bill said to them "well, he doesn't know that he's not supposed to be able to make those shots"... and in these cases, ignorance of The Envelope is a benefit, because you ignore the assumptions and limitations others have taken on and, in that ignorance, stretch the limits of The Possible.
But I seem to have become jaded in the intervening years. Cynical maybe. And my default impulse has become to say No instead of Yes.
Is it fear? Is it risk aversion? Or is it just an easy giving up to say No?
I think there should be some wisdom in how to approach these things, these topics. To have a firm and realistic (dare I say "wise"?) interpretation of the possible. But at the same time I want to have that childlike ignorance... to ignore the assumed boundaries to push them outwards. I want to be right (everyone does). I don't want to fail (no one does). But without a certain amount of daring, progress is not made... it becomes just the same thing over and over again. How do you venture into the new with a healthy ignorance of limitations (to push them) but without the foolish ignorance of bad decisions?
This, alas, is my task. To stop trying to say no and start trying to say yes.
