[sixdimensional]

For what it's worth, I actually do understand your sentiment. I am also a pragmatist and practitioner and find that academic theory sometimes has to "bend" for lack of a better word.

That said, I was brought up to find what is useful and good regardless of whether it comes from academia or practice. It's a beautiful thing to be able to find a balance of building an operational world view that borrows from both theory and practice.

It is my personal observation that much theory is based on observation of practice + theoretical projection, followed by more observation - i.e. the scientific method.

I loved Adam Savage's comment that sometimes science boils down to doing stuff and writing it down. I think as long as we find a good balance in learning from the past and building on it, while not letting the past limit our future endeavors for no reason, we can have the best of both worlds.