This is an extension of the discussion on the Difficulty of getting programmers (sic). (The somewhat obscure sounding title of that pages means something like "the difficulty of getting programmers involved".)
To sum up, it is can be hard to get anything done! This is, I guess, a philosophical point. But this is AsteroidMeta, after all, and philosophical discussions are OK here. Trust me, I'll try to make this relevant.
I was talking to this guy at a little get together I went to last night, and he was emphasized the importance of perseverance. The example was, if I say I want to walk from Minnesota to Guatemala, people might think I'm crazy, but if I take off and start walking, and keep going every day, eventually I will get there.
Sure, there might be some trouble crossing borders, and it might be risky or expensive in other ways, but the statement is probably true.
Another philosophical idea from that conversation was the notion that if you can imagine something, it is likely to become feasible with sufficient work. Again, I suppose that there are certain limits due to physics (and, fundamentally, mathematics) but again, I suppose the statement is probably true – especially if we take simulation into account. So that is somewhat encouraging, too.
One of the big difficulties associated with trying to get things done is that sometimes you imagine that other people should be doing them. After all, you have a certain skill set, and certain time constraints, and other people may appear to be much more qualified to work on some task than you are. Some of the time this is true.
But other times, it is best just to push ahead with your partial and imperfect skills, and to try to teach yourself what you need to know to get the task done. This relates to the discussion about learning new skills and building new systems, here. As you build your own skills, and improve the systems you are working on to the point where others will be interested in and able to get involved, eventually things may take off pretty well. (Something similar is also mentioned here: people won't get involved with something unless they see benefits associated with their involvement.)
Of course, by then, you will no doubt have dreampt up other difficult goals.
Even when a system is flowing along pretty well, one of the reasons that it can be difficult to get things done is that it can be difficult to know what other agents in the system are up to. It can even be hard to know what you yourself are up to! Our understanding of ourselves is, I'd say, pretty limited.
Various collaboration tools can help reduce the difficulty associated with awareness of, and information flow among various project participants. If people post detailed TODO lists, you can see: "oh, I see, the reason so and so isn't doing this is that they are busy with that." And so on. The more people spell out what they are up to, and what the expected benefits and costs associated with their pet projects are, and the timelines for their involvement with these various projects, the better others will be able to assess the usefulness of making a contribution of effort, or giving the person room to think, or whatever.
Again, even in single agent environments, it is good to try to keep track of various experiential data, since you can use it to better understand yourself, your motivations, and your capabilities. --jcorneli Sun Mar 27 21:35:03 2005 UTC