[mr_toad]

The first two paragraphs of the article are a straw man. I think most of us were biting our tongues at that point.

The thesis of the rest of the article contradicts the initial premise.

Your scenario of ramdomly digging holes are a perfect example of what the author is explaining: “Critically, convex payoffs benefit from uncertainty and disorder.“

[fujimotos]

IMHO, the author tries to argue that we can get a better understanding by thinking in term of the structure of the payoff function, rather than focusing on the input itself.

Yes, the try-and-error process and chance are important, but the convexity of the output function is exactly what makes them so rewarding.