We all ride on the shoulders of giants. For example, I program, but cannot write a compiler. However, I do sense that there is a platonic ideal behind the ideas of programming, and that even though physical causality points at machine code as being more real than the overlaying language, this isn’t really true – numbers are more fundamental than any calculator.
I’ve had many dinner conversations about Apple products recently. I have to say that I’ve never been inspired by them. I readily buy them for friends and family, but not for myself.
I do this out of a sense that being in touch with how computation tools are used is crucial to my long-term happiness, and with respect to that the products which Apple makes are just too perfect. They dull the mind to the realities of computation, and promote a large separation between creator and consumer.
For a toolmaker, Apple products don’t leave you hungry or foolish enough to keep digging for truths. For most people this is not a problem, but then again, most people might see their jobs replaced by computer programs in the coming decades.