There's a nice philosophy podcast with a big back catalog called Partially Examined Life. This is the episode on Simone Weil, a philosopher I had never heard of prior. I found it pretty fascinating, especially for programmers:
It was surprisingly relevant to a conversation I had with a friend about the "psychology of work". (At one point, the group in the podcast concretely discusses the idea of a business manager who is formerly an individually contributor, who mechanizes his business, moves up and up in the "abstraction" of all aspects of the business operations, and then rather than being 'totally fulfilled' in the end, finds himself with a whole lot less creative work to do. This is eerily personal for me!)
I also think it's a nice conversation because it explains, without explicitly referencing it, why programming is such a satisfying creative activity, even if automation of labor is ultimately dehumanizing to laborers unless the automation is "total" or "complete", as discussed more in the podcast and by Weil in one of her essays ("Theoretical Picture of a Free Society").
Finally, it relates the idea of flow & creativity to the concept of individual & human liberty, a connection that had never really occurred to me before.
Nice observation on this "hyper-optiming" the human element away! You might like this quote, in a similar vein:
“There are two ranges in the growth of tools: the range within which machines are used to extend human capability and the range in which they are used to contract, eliminate, or replace human functions. In the first, man as an individual can exercise authority on his own behalf and therefore assume responsibility. In the second, the machine takes over—first reducing the range of choice and motivation in both the operator and the client, and second imposing its own logic and demand on both. Survival depends on establishing procedures which permit ordinary people to recognize these ranges and to opt for survival in freedom, to evaluate the structure built into tools and institutions so they can exclude those which by their structure are destructive, and control those which are useful.”
https://pca.st/episode/46ef86e6-36a9-45db-a263-e278b150b2a4
It was surprisingly relevant to a conversation I had with a friend about the "psychology of work". (At one point, the group in the podcast concretely discusses the idea of a business manager who is formerly an individually contributor, who mechanizes his business, moves up and up in the "abstraction" of all aspects of the business operations, and then rather than being 'totally fulfilled' in the end, finds himself with a whole lot less creative work to do. This is eerily personal for me!)
I also think it's a nice conversation because it explains, without explicitly referencing it, why programming is such a satisfying creative activity, even if automation of labor is ultimately dehumanizing to laborers unless the automation is "total" or "complete", as discussed more in the podcast and by Weil in one of her essays ("Theoretical Picture of a Free Society").
Finally, it relates the idea of flow & creativity to the concept of individual & human liberty, a connection that had never really occurred to me before.