leftbit

But why should I put my time into reading and thinking about your article if you didn't think it worth your time to actually think about and write it?

Hope the Next Big Thing (TM) is the Electric Monk.

Makes me wonder how much information from prehistoric civilizations got lost by cutting up their libraries into wedding rings...

One aspect of humor depends on cognitive flexibility. Puns work that way.

So if you're not able to make the right mental context switch at the right moment, you won't get the joke.

It's difficult to reason about intelligence in this context.

Human intelligence is defined by behavior we humans value. Intelligence tests are geared to measuring these aspects.

Intelligence tests devised by animals would look totally different - and it's quite thinkable humans wouldn't do too well taking them.

Wouldn't assume that animals have less language ability than we humans, unless we totally figured out what other species are really talking about. Unless we do this is just an assumption.

Yes, that was clever.

But he showed real intelligence by never doing anything like this in front of us ever again. ;)

And they are able to show insight and planning to get what they want...

Once a friend of our dog came visiting, grabbed his favorite stuffy and happily chewed it in the yard. Which our dog clearly resented.

So he cleaned up the yard and hid all other toys in the house. Usually that's our job - he never bothers to look after his toys.

Then he came out with an old tennis ball, pranced around, played with it, like "Dude, this is the BEST toy EVER invented. An it's mine."

His friend dropped the coveted stuffy and came over to investigate... our dog dropped the ball, grabbed the stuffy and hid it in the house.

His friend was left with a slimy, boring ball.

I really can't think of any other explanation - he knew how to get his stuffy, but also anticipated this trick wouldn't work twice. So the cleanup in advance.

A pity, I'd have liked to visit Scotland again. Perhaps it's just me, but when a country decides to treat me like a criminal suspect instead of a welcomed visitor I just don't want to go there anymore.

Exactly that - the subtitle really says it all: "A Handbook of Agile Software Craftsmanship"

A craftsman is an expert in his field who applies his knowledge and techniques judiciously, not religiously or automatically.

Really don't like the enforcing. Okay, mixed feelings there.

Rules should help you along, perhaps set a framework for your thinking. But they never should limit you in achieving your goal. When establishing a rule you should also specify what you want to achieve by it, how you'll measure its effects and under which conditions it should be removed.

Rigid rule enforcement has a strong danger of shifting the priorities of the developers to the detriment of your business.

Don't know if this is really a bad thing - had the same problems with the book, but the apparent contradictions made me really think about the stuff. So I'm quite prepared to consider his advice, I'd never turn it into gospel.

Don't think so. If the senior engineer is worth his salt he should know that programming is always about finding a balance between several aspects of a given problem - some of them technical, some of them human. As long as the code does what it's supposed to do the rest is mostly up to personal taste - so yes, you can have an insightful discussion, but there's only to learn, nothing to "win" for all participants.