Over complicating matters

Over complicating matters

by Mike Gambino

Sometimes I’m blown away by how some in the industry of landscape lighting try to unnecessarily over analyze and or complicate things. I saw a post on an industry message bd where someone who is supposedly installing landscape lighting for payment  was asking about the footcandle requirement for pathways and walkways.

Are you kidding me? Really?

Another so called pro referred him to a book where supposedly such information could be obtained.

First of all for all intents and purposes this information is totally irrelevant unless there was some sort of specific specification for some intended purpose.Perhaps expert testimony in a lawsuit however I have been hired as an expert witness and footcandle measurements never came up.

But under most every other situation this type of information is totally irrelevant.

If you don’t know as a professional how to sufficiently illuminate a walkway then you either have had very little or no experience with lighting or are completely incompetent.

In either scenario that individual should not be offering landscape lighting services for pay.

So what is the worst case scenario? You finish the project and the client deems the pathways need more light, so you change the bulbs to increase the wattage of the fixtures. A pro will always leave room for easy upgrades and expandability.

Furthermore in order to read footcandles one would need a light meter and know how to use it.

This evening I stumbled across a website that crystalizes this idea of ignoring the simplest easiest solution and over complicating matters.

This phenomenon actually has a name.

Its called Occam’s razor. I have copied and pasted a portion of the article describing it below.

You’ve probably heard it before: The simplest explanation is usually the right one. Detectives use it to deduce who’s the likeliest suspect in a murder case — you know, the butler did it. Doctors ­use it to determine the illness behind a set of symptoms.

This line of reasoning is called Occam’s razor. It’s used in a wide variety of ways throughout the world as a means to slice through a problem or situation and eliminate unnecessary elements. But what we call the razor is a little different than what its author originally wrote. There are two parts that are considered the basis of Occam’s razor, and they were originally written in Latin:

  • The Principle of Plurality – Plurality should not be posited without necessity
  • The Principle of Parsimony – It is pointless to do with more what is done with less

Taken together, they represent the basis of humanity’s investigation into the universe, and the way we see our environment is largely based upon Occam’s razor. There’s no telling what kind of world we would live in today without Occam’s razor. Would we have the Internet? Would we have inoculations?

Consider simple systems in nature, like viruses and plants, and their ability to carry out complex tasks such as infection and photosynthesis. We value these simple models. And when it comes to man-made systems, we tend to base structures upon what we already know works — the simplest explanation to us — like computer memory modeled on our own brain processes. All of which points to the principles of plurality and parsimony.

However, one of the key things that Occam’s razor reveals is the subjectivity with which we view the universe. Sure the sky is blue, we know that by looking at it, but what shade of blue is it exactly? Anyone who has ever engaged in a debate over whether a dark-colored sock is black or navy can appreciate the bias of our worldview and how it affects our decisions.

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