Discipline And Dogma

I have an idea, and I don't feel like dropping it yet, just because you disagree or have a "better" idea. Is that discipline? Or is that dogma?

I'm now given to thinking that dogma has more to do with authority than discipline. A body of ideas in this case would be dogmatic if,

Their source is considered an authority. Whether that be for political, psychological or religious reasons.
Conflicting ideas are rendered impotent purely by virtue of their having some other origin. (See NotInventedHere.)

I'm not sure what the dichotomy would then be, but DisciplineAndDogma doesn't quite cut it.

This definition would not only give dogma quite some scope, but would also make its boundaries very fuzzy. Imagine a group of people defined by some shared beliefs. These people would, traditionally, be considered victims of dogmatism only of there exists some core doctrine or smaller group controlling their beliefs. But if the beliefs become accepted and ingrained, the controlling group grows to contain all the members of the larger group. The dogma is now self-imposed. Now consider what happens if members start to leave. How small can the group get before they become just another bunch of people with odd ideas? -- ChrisSteinbach

We seem to be living in a time when low commitment is popular and high commitment is seen as counter-survival. Commitment level is at the center of this issue of discipline versus dogma. Adaptability is seen as a high virtue. How often can you adapt? How often is it good for you to adapt? Every time you adapt, you abandon a previous way. What if you're always leaving just before the movie starts to get really good?

I'll often bail out on an idea before it's had a fair chance, because I'm convinced prematurely that it won't work, or more commonly, because it didn't turn out as easy to implement as I'd hoped. I consider this a flaw in judgment, due to a lack of discipline on my part. The problem is, there's no negative reward for this behavior, except time wasted. On the other hand, if you hold onto an idea too long, you risk appearing as though you have trouble adapting to new things, and can win the ridicule of a host of juvenile extremists (no reference to XP intended or permitted here). It's just trendy these days to be fickle, even if you're a boy. Oh my, did I say that? ~~ WaldenMathews

In basic terms, our civilization depends upon the spontaneity and fulfillment of the individual. Our civilization is in sad straits, not because we allow spontaneity or fulfillment to individuals, but because we deny, and because our institutions base upon that premise.

Our systems and institutions have taught us to fear spontaneity. We think that every freeway shooting or terrorist suicide attack is an example of people giving in to their sudden whims. But these are, in fact, the exact and total opposite; excessive examples of people who have repressed and denied themselves a thousand personal impulses which individually were leading them in the right direction.

This fear has taught some of us to scoff at those who would appear fearless.

Why is it so difficult for us to learn what freedom is? How far do you think a flower would get if in the morning it turned its face toward the sky and said, "I demand the sun. And now I need rain. So I demand it. And I demand bees to come and take my pollen. I demand, therefore that the sun shall shine for a certain number of hours, and that the rain shall pour for a certain number of hours... and that the bees come - bees A, B, C, D, and E, for I shall accept no other bees to come. I demand that discipline operate, and that the soil shall follow my command. But I do not allow the soil any spontaneity of its own. And I do not allow the sun any spontaneity of its own. And I do not agree that the sun knows what it is doing. I demand that all these things follow my ideas of discipline.

And who, I ask you, would listen? For in the miraculous spontaneity of the sun, there is discipline that utterly escapes you, and a knowledge beyond any that we know. And in the spontaneous playing of the bees from flower to flower, there is a discipline beyond any that you know, and laws that follow their own knowledge, and joy that is beyond command. For true discipline, you see, is found only in spontaneity.

Spontaneity knows its own order.

-- JaneRoberts

...my spontaneous desire is to chop the original into mincemeat in order to become the more intimate with its beauty. Well, not quite. But please explain what spontaneity has to do with discipline. Are they opposite? Does the work of art above derive from 100% spontaneity and 0% discipline, do you suppose? Or does balance enter into it at all?

[MontyPython allusion alert.] Our topics on this page are Discipline, and Dogma. Oh, well, okay. Our topics are Discipline, Dogma, and Balance... No, wait, they're Discipline, Dogma, Spontaneity, Repression, and Balance. Our topics are... Let's start over.

The topic on this page is "Discipline and Dogma only work when they harness, not hinder, Spontaneity." The answer to the original question is, "Do what you feel inspired to do - be disciplined (and dogmatic) about respecting your inclinations."

Did you know that if you sever an earthworm into a front half and a hind half, the hind half will "writhe in agony", while the front half will not? Except that the hind half is not "writhing" at all. It is simply giving in to all of the spontaneous impulses of severed nerves... ~~ WaldenMathews

This whole Web site is about people spontaneously editing pages to produce output that some think is better than discipline could have produced. The end result is usually both very rich and often very controlled. Spontaneity does not mean loss of control.

"He who breaks something to find out what it is has lost the path to wisdom" -- Gandalf

OnTheOtherHand?, I would prefer my heart surgeon have gone to all four years of med school, plus internship and residency, rather than "spontaneously" decided to follow his bliss and skip classes. -- PeteHardie

If a medical student is spontaneously becoming not a doctor, I would prefer they spontaneously drop out, and I get operated on by someone who spontaneously >did< become a doctor. S. has nothing to do with shirking responsibilities, or losing control, but those may be results that we've been taught to fear in others.

Spontaneity good.

Repression bad.

On a software project, if somebody spontaneously thinks of a better way to design something, do not tell them...

you're not the architect, go back to your cubicle
we have no tests, so we can't refactor
we are not working on that module right now
you are all alone and have no-one to spot your gymnastics
we don't use CVS (correctly), so we can't roll-back if you screw up
you don't own that module so mind your own business
we like CowboyCoding here, so we'll just change it back the minute you are not looking
we don't know how to refactor, so you can't put that idea in
we never changed the code before, so your change will break 75% of it. And we don't use CVS, pairing, or unit tests. We have bigger problems than your little change, but guess who just drew the ScapeGoat card!
we are shipping in X time units, so we can't go playing now.

You change the design and see if everyone likes it. Spontaneously.

This is at the heart of "EmergentBehavior" and one of its disciplines, "EmergentDesign".

ExtremeProgramming works by (among other things) spreading out the opportunities for S. across the project's lifecycle, and evenly throughout the team. It does not depend on Big Inspiration Up Front.

It strikes me that thinking it is possible to just change the design, spontaneously, really IS CowboyCoding. -- BenTilly