[MattPalmer1086]

Funny, when I was a software developer I thought the same thing.

While there have been a few developers I have worked with who were total stars, most of them were distinctly average (unsurprisingly) and lacked basic curiosity. Even of the great developers, there are very few I would trust to do anything other than write software.

The other thing I have noted over my career is how developers consistently underrate the skills, experience and intelligence of non developers.

[caeril]

> and lacked basic curiosity

This is an incredible take, and I have no idea where you have seen this, as it's entirely counter to my own personal experience. I have never, in my life, met a finance bro or management bro who had any non-work curiosity about anything beyond sports, cars, and sex.

Most engineers I know are immensely curious about how the world works, how the universe works, etc, and are constantly trying to learn and understand.

[brayhite]

The “just tell me what to build, I don’t need to understand why” trope exists for a reason.

I’ve worked with a range of engineers in terms of their curiosity. In my experience, the ones who cared enough to ask or push back on decisions were exceptions, not the rule.

This doesn’t mean they weren’t curious people. It just means they weren’t curious about The BusinessTM or The MarketTM.

[caeril]

> “just tell me what to build, I don’t need to understand why”

I suspect that insofar as this exists, it's because when junior engineers question the utility of the requirements or user stories, they are told specifically to stfu because nerds don't understand business. Over time, the message get received?

That said, I've very rarely seen an engineer like this. In fact, I frequently encounter the opposite: the sterotypical asperger's who doesn't know when they're being rude with their probing.