When I advise people to write simpler code I do mean "not clever." Nor do I mean "insightful." In fact, please make it so obvious that in reading it I don't gain/need/curse/applaud any insights.
Make it simple enough that a brand new completely green junior member of the team immediately understands it on first reading.
And if you can't make the code completely obvious (e.g. the sorting example), just add a comment. A simple one.
None of this is about the creator's cleverness or deep understanding or speed or what tooling can do. It's not about the creator or the machine at all. Simple code is about clarity for all the people who will read and (hopefully not) debug it later.
Make it simple enough that a brand new completely green junior member of the team immediately understands it on first reading.
And if you can't make the code completely obvious (e.g. the sorting example), just add a comment. A simple one.
None of this is about the creator's cleverness or deep understanding or speed or what tooling can do. It's not about the creator or the machine at all. Simple code is about clarity for all the people who will read and (hopefully not) debug it later.