| I suppose before I give a thorough response, why compare the apple to the watermelon? I personally have no clue who the engineers are on this earth that architect a fly-by-wire system. Actually, the complexity and critical nature of it is so beyond developing a UI, that anyone would know the difference. Now read the last statement above again. Outside of tech, is it truly true that anyone would know the difference? Or are we just ‘IT guys’ to the rest of the world. To fight amongst ourselves over titles, when we ourselves appreciate the differences, can only happen if we are trying to attain external validation. Case study:
Developer A: I am a software engineer at Facebook Developer B: I am a software engineer at Boeing Developer A: Billions use my software Developer B: People die when I make bugs The problem is not that Developer A and B don’t understand or appreciate the difference. The problem is the rest of the world doesn’t, therefore the industry has zero status. I’m arguing we are manifesting a frustration internally amongst ourselves from the greater sin of lack of respect given to us from outside. Which brings me to my final point. If there is internal resentment, that a Facebook engineer makes more than a Boeing engineer, then we failed as an industry in not compensating appropriately. If the manifestation is from unfairness, we should examine that. If the Surgeon gets paid less or the same as the Podiatrist, and is resentful and bitter, we need not turn a million stones to find the crux of the matter. And, suddenly, the surgeon yells ‘that foot doctor can’t hold a scalpel if their life depended on it’. Lamentations of a deeper problem amongst ourselves. All emotions are valid here, as the injustice is consistent and real. For most part, I am trying to distill the dialectal argument into it’s rhetorical form. |
I agree we're perhaps dickering over distinctions no one external cares about, akin to characters in "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield". Is our internal perspective as valueless as the mindset of those characters above, or is there use in hammering out a common understanding for the general public before it's handed to us?
That being asked, the distinctions may be moot. Most of us have probably 10-20 years of rapidly dwindling utility in our respective realms due to the swift boot that is ML/DL/etc. And your point will remain more poignant at that time: "will anyone outside of our field know or care about the difference?".