From Complexity To Simplicity

Adam Bosworth's ISCO04 talk, and the numerous controversial comments it generated, are certain to advance the art and science of software development. I hope Adam gives more talks like these.

Advances in software design, like the advancement of knowledge in the field of science, require many long hours of hard work, observation, and experimentation to extract the simplicity that subsumes the complex phenomena in the world around us. The knowledge gained must then be exchanged and vigorously debated.

Consider the combined work of Nicolaus Copernicus (2/19/1473 - 5/24/1543), Tycho Brahe (12/14/1546 - 10/24/1601), Johannes Kepler (12/27/1571 - 11/15/1630), Galileo Galilei (2/15/1564 - 1/8/1642), and Isaac Newton <1/4/1546 - 10/24/1601). The work of all of them, plus many others, was required to reduce centuries of baffling complexity to the elegant simplicity of Newton's universal law of gravitation and his laws of motion. This reduction of complexity to simplicity provided the bedrock foundation for much of modern engineering, and is as valid today as it was 300 years ago.

Such advancement and improvement does not come without controversy. Along with his considerable contribution to the body of knowledge, Galileo was convicted of heresy!