Have you ever been faced with a software engineering challenge, A problem so complex that you end up rethinking your choice of becoming a software engineer?
Yes, we have all been there. Sometimes you feel like pulling your hair out. You go through over a hundred different emotions at once. Not a pleasant position to be in but I think that is the thrill of software engineering. Creating solutions to complex problems.
I will be sharing a concept that is guaranteed to help in such situations.
I came across this video of Elon Musk in 2013. In this video, where he talks about something called “First Principles thinking”.
As humans we reason by analogy. We try to connect something to something that has already happened or we had experienced. Which is necessarily not a bad thing.
Now ask yourself what happens when something happens or a software engineering challenge comes up that we have no analogy for ?
I always think how did software engineers survive before stack overflow.
What are the foundations of First Principle Thinking.
The very core of first principle thinking lies in its ability to dismantle complex problems into their most fundamental elements. This is known as “REDUCTIONISM”.
To illustrate this concept imagine you are about to bake a cake. Baking a cake may seem like a walk in a park, but it is actually a tad bit complex.
So many things go into the production of a cake. You may be tempted to blindly follow a recipe without understanding why each ingredient or step is needed.
Now Imagine you follow this recipe word for word and the cake batter turns out funny.
In this case what do you do?
The recipe might say 3 eggs, but you used 3 large sized eggs. Remember the recipe does not clearly state the size of eggs it just says 3 eggs. You used 3 large eggs which means you have more liquid to deal with here than intended.
In situations like this first principles thinking comes to the rescue. You immediately know that flour and liquid ingredients are what affects the consistency of the cake batter, hence you make adjustments.
If you want to solve problems like Elon Musk I think you should apply this concept.