An elaboration on episode 49 's description of the brain as a prediction engine, focusing on a theory of what emotions are, how they're learned, and how emotional experiences are constructed. Emotions like anger and fear turn out to be not that different from concepts like money or bicycle, except that the brain attends more to internal sensations than to external perceptions. If the predictive brain theory is true, the brain is stranger than we imagine; perhaps stranger than we can imagine . Ma...
Jun 20, 2025•33 min•Ep. 52
Memories appear to be constructed by plugging together stored templates. Do concepts operate the same way? Sources Suzi Travis, " False Memories are Exactly What You Need ", 2024. Lisa Feldman Barrett, " The theory of constructed emotion: an active inference account of interoception and categorization ," Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience , 2017. Credits Image of street warning from Dublin, Ireland, via Flickr user tunnelblick . Licensed Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic ...
Jun 08, 2025•6 min•Ep. 51
We see a creature near us, and we describe it as a dog. Why that and not "mammal" or "animal"? And if that dog's a Springer Spaniel, and we know it's a Springer Spaniel, why do we nevertheless call it a "dog"? In an apparent digression, I discuss the idea in cognitive science of a "basic level of categorization" (or abstraction). While we construct hierarchies and taxonomies, we tend to operate at one specific level: one that's not too abstract and not too concrete. Sources George Lakoff, Women,...
Jun 07, 2025•16 min•Ep. 50
It's fairly pointless to analyze metaphors in isolation. They're used in a cumulative way as part of real or imagined conversations. That meshes with a newish way of understanding the brain: as largely a prediction engine . If that's true, what would it mean for metaphorical names in code? Sources * Lisa Feldman Barrett, " The theory of constructed emotion: an active inference account of interoception and categorization ," Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience , 2017. (I also read her How ...
May 20, 2025•19 min•Ep. 49
When we name a class name `Invoice`, are we communicating or thinking metaphorically? I used to think we were; now I think we aren't. This episode explains one reason: ordinary conversation frequently uses multiple metaphors when talking about some concept. Sometimes we even mix inconsistent or contradictory metaphors within the same sentence. That's not the way we use metaphorical names in programming. Sources Lakoff and Johnson, Metaphors We Live By , 1980. (I worked from the first edition; th...
May 16, 2025•27 min•Ep. 48
In 1970, Winston W. Royce published a paper “ Managing the Development of Large Software Systems .” Later authors cited it as the justification for what had come to be called the "waterfall process." Yet Royce had quite specifically described that process as one that is "simplistic" and "invites failure." That's weird. People not only promoted a process Royce had said was inadequate, they cited him as their justification. And they ignored all the elaborations that he said would make the inadequa...
Mar 14, 2025•27 min•Ep. 47
Conceptual metaphor is a theory in cognitive science that claims understanding and problem-solving often (but not always) happen via systems of metaphor. I present the case for it, and also expand on the theory in the light of previous episodes on ecological and embodied cognition. This episode is theory. The next episode will cover practice. This is the beginning of a series roughly organized around ways of discovering where your thinking has gone astray, with an undercurrent of how techniques ...
Feb 26, 2025•32 min•Ep. 46
In this episode, I ask the question: what would a software design style inspired by ecological and embodied cognition be like? I sketch some tentative ideas. I plan to explore this further at nh.oddly-influenced.dev , a blog that will document an app I'm beginning to write. In my implementation, I plan to use Erlang-style " processes " ( actors ) as the core building block. Many software design heuristics are (implicitly) intended to avoid turning the app into a Big Ball of Mud . Evolution is no...
Dec 31, 2023•38 min•Ep. 45
In the '80s, David Chapman and Phil Agre were doing work within AI that was very compatible with the ecological and embodied cognition approach I've been describing. They produced a program, Pengi, that played a video game well enough (given the technology of the time) even though it had nothing like an internal representation of the game board and barely any persistent state at all. In this interview, David describes the source of their crazy ideas and how Pengi worked. Pengi is more radically ...
Dec 04, 2023•44 min•Ep. 44
Scientists studying ecological and embodied cognition try to use algorithms as little as they can. Instead, they favor dynamical systems, typically represented as a set of equations that share variables in a way that is somewhat looplike: component A changes, which changes component B, which changes component A, and so on. Peculiarities of behavior can be explained as such systems reaching stable states. This episode describes two sets of equations that predict surprising properties of what seem...
Nov 07, 2023•26 min•Ep. 43
Suppose you believed that the ecological/embodied cognitive scientists of last episode had a better grasp on cognition than does our habitual position that the brain is a computer, passively perceiving the environment, then directing the body to perform steps in calculated plans. If so, technical practices like test-driven design, refactoring in response to "code smells," and the early-this-century fad for physical 3x5 cards might make more sense. I explain how. I also sketch how people might us...
Oct 27, 2023•34 min•Ep. 42
Embodied or Ecological Cognition is an offshoot of cognitive science that rejects or minimizes one of its axioms: that the computer is a good analogy for the brain. That is, that the brain receives inputs from the senses; computes with that input as well as with goals, plans, and stored representations of the world; issues instructions to the body; and GOTO PERCEPTION. The offshoot gives a larger causal role to the environment and the body, and a lesser role to the brain. Why store instructions ...
Oct 12, 2023•32 min•Ep. 41
This excerpt from episode 40 contains material independent of that episode's topic (collaborative circles) that might be of interest to people who don't care about collaborative circles. It mostly discusses a claim, due to Andy Clark, that words are not labels for concepts. Rather, words come first and concepts accrete around them. As a resolute, concepts are messy. Which is fine, because they don't need to be tidy. Sources Louise Barrett, Beyond the Brain: How Body and Environment Shape Animal ...
Sep 29, 2023•16 min
Software design patterns were derived from the work of architect Christopher Alexander, specifically his book A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction . This excerpt (from episode 39) addresses a problem: most software people don't know one of Alexander's most important ideas, that of "forces". Sources Christopher Alexander et al, A Pattern Language: Towns, Buildings, Construction , 1977. Mentioned (or that I wish I'd found a way to mention) Gamma et al, Design Patterns , 2004 Eric Eva...
Sep 27, 2023•14 min
The last in the series on collaborative circles. The creative roles in a collaborative circle, discussed with reference to both Christopher Alexander's forces and ideas from ecological and embodied cognition. Special emphasis on collaborative pairs. Sources Michael P. Farrell, Collaborative Circles: Friendship Dynamics and Creative Work , 2001 Louise Barrett, Beyond the Brain: How Body and Environment Shape Animal and Human Minds , 2011 Anthony Chemero, Radical Embodied Cognitive Science , 2011 ...
Sep 25, 2023•45 min•Ep. 40
Farrell describes a number of distinct roles important to the development of a collaborative circle. This episode is devoted to the roles important in the early stages, when the circle is primarily about finding out what it is they actually dislike about the status quo. In order to make the episode more "actionable", I describe the roles using Christopher Alexander's style of concentrating on opposing "forces" that need to be balanced, resolved, or accommodated. Sources Michael P. Farrell, Colla...
Sep 14, 2023•32 min•Ep. 39
Collaborative circles don't have a smooth trajectory toward creative breakthrough. I describe the more common trajectory. I also do a little speculation on how a circle's "shared vision" consists of goals, habits, and "anti-trigger words." I also suggest that common notions of trust or psychological safety may not be fine-grained enough to understand circle-style creative breakthroughs. I continue to work from Michael P. Farrell, Collaborative Circles: Friendship Dynamics and Creative Work , 200...
Aug 24, 2023•28 min•Ep. 38
An interview with Lorin Hochstein , resilience engineer and author . Our discussion was about how to handle a complex system that falls down hard and – especially – how to then prepare for the next incident. The discussion is anchored by David D. Woods' 2018 paper, “The Theory of Graceful Extensibility: Basic Rules that Govern Adaptive Systems” , which (in keeping with the theme of the podcast) focuses on a general topic, drawing more from emergency medicine than from software. Lorin Hochstein R...
Aug 14, 2023•45 min•Ep. 37
I was a core member of what Farrell would call a collaborative circle: the four people who codified Context-Driven Testing . That makes me think I can supplement Farrell's account with what it feels like to be inside a circle. I try to be "actionable", not just some guy writing a memoir. My topics are: what the context-driven circle was reacting against; the nature of the reaction and the resulting shared vision; how geographically-distributed circles work (including the first-wave feminist Ultr...
Aug 03, 2023•48 min•Ep. 36
Michael P. Farrell's Collaborative Circles: Friendship Dynamics and Creative Work (2001) describes how groups of people follow a trajectory from vague dislike of the status quo, to a sharpened criticism of it, to a shared vision (and supporting techniques) intended to displace it. The development of so-called "lightweight processes" in the 1990s can be viewed through that lens. I drag in a little discussion of binary oppositions as used in Lévi-Strauss's Structural Anthropology (1963) and later ...
Jul 21, 2023•30 min•Ep. 35
Michael P. Farrell's Collaborative Circles: Friendship Dynamics and Creative Work (2001) is about how groups of people ("circles") begin with discomfort about the status quo and, after collaboration and discussion, make creative breakthroughs. It's based on six case studies. Four are circles of artists and painters, one looks at the early development of Freud's psychoanalysis, and one is devoted to a particular group of "first wave" feminist agitators. This episode aims to tempt you to want to l...
Jul 04, 2023•25 min•Ep. 34
Jessica Kerr (known to computers everywhere as @jessitron) is a software developer, speaker, and symmathecist . (A symmathesy is a learning system composed of learning parts. To her, each software team is a symmathesy composed of the people on the team, the running software, and all of their tools.) @jessitron is another of those people who apply ideas from outside software to software, including in her role as a developer advocate at Honeycomb , a company that aims to make the workings of softw...
Jun 06, 2023•41 min•Ep. 33
The final episode of "the Foucault trilogy". Ways of evaluating humans that became common during the ~1750-1850 period. Bentham's Panopticon as a metaphor. Self-improvement via exhibitionism. Final reflections on Foucault. Sources Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison , 1975. C.G. Prado, Starting With Foucault (2/e), 2000. Ian Hacking, The Social Construction of What? , 1999. Other sources Mississippi State University Extension, "Dairy Cattle Judging" . Jeremy Bentham: ...
May 08, 2023•33 min•Ep. 32
An intermediate episode. It seems wrong to talk about Foucault without mentioning his theory of power and societal change. But I don't think there's a lot you can *do* with that theory in the sense of "applying it to software". So it doesn't really fit with the podcast theme. But his is a disturbing theory for the problem-solvers among us, so I make it more palatable by comparing it to a cult horror movie from 1997. Sources Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison , 1975 C...
May 01, 2023•20 min•Ep. 31
Part 1 is a synopsis of Foucault's claim that the societal attitude toward punishment of criminals changed radically over a period of about 80 years, starting in the mid-1700s: from punishment as vengeance, to punishment as persuading the minds of many, to punishment as correcting the personality of one. Books Michel Foucault, Discipline and Punish: the Birth of the Prison , 1975 C.G. Prado, Starting With Foucault (2/e), 2000 Random other stuff Brian Marick, " Artisanal Retro-Futurism Crossed wi...
Apr 19, 2023•30 min•Ep. 30
Open Systems Theory (OST) is an approach to organizational transformation that dates back to the late 1940s. It's been applied a fair amount, but hasn't gotten much mindshare in the software world. It has similarities to Agile, but leans into self-organization in a much more thoroughgoing way. For example, in an OST organization, teams aren't given a product backlog, they create it themselves. if a team decides they need to slow the pace of delivery to learn new things or to spend more time refa...
Apr 10, 2023•45 min•Ep. 29
I describe how the Gal Oya irrigation system got better. It's an example that might inspire hope. I also imagine how a software codebase and its team might have a similar improvement. As with earlier episodes, I'm leaning on Elinor Ostrom’s 1990 book, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action , and Erik Nordman ’s 2021 book, The Uncommon Knowledge of Elinor Ostrom: Essential Lessons for Collective Action . I also mention James C. Scott's Seeing Like a State , whi...
Mar 14, 2023•20 min•Ep. 28
A short episode that encourages members of software teams to give Elinor Ostrom's ideas a try, in two ways: 1. I'm arranging for Elinor Ostrom's intellectual heirs to provide support. 2. Your situation is not worse than those of Sri Lankan farmers in the Gal Oya irrigation system. A commons-style approach helped them, so why couldn't it help you? I'm looking for teams who want to collaborate with Indiana University's Ostrom Workshop , and I intend to provide financing....
Mar 09, 2023•10 min•Ep. 27
Ostrom's core principles for the design of successful commons: how to monitor compliance with rules, how to punish non-compliance, how to resolve disputes, and how to participate in making rules. Elinor Ostrom, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action , 1990 Erik Nordman , The Uncommon Knowledge of Elinor Ostrom: Essential Lessons for Collective Action , 2021 "The dirty little secret of contract law" Image of lobster buoys from Flickr user Raging Wire , licensed...
Mar 01, 2023•29 min•Ep. 26
This is the first of two or three episodes that draw on Elinor Ostrom’s 1990 book, Governing the Commons: The Evolution of Institutions for Collective Action , and Erik Nordman ’s 2021 book, The Uncommon Knowledge of Elinor Ostrom: Essential Lessons for Collective Action . What I hope is that those lessons apply to the problem of keeping codebases from devolving into unworkable piles of crap. Ostrom has nine design principles for designing successful commons governance. I mention them all in thi...
Feb 20, 2023•26 min•Ep. 25
