There are standards (and surely more to come), but I still wouldn’t call it engineering. Then again, I’m just a theoretical physicist who wandered into software development out of necessity, so treat that as a biased call.

Sometimes I wonder: do people still believe a man's word? I do honor that. I have great respect for humans who give and follow their word. Sure, they make mistakes and you bet your butt they hold themselves accountable but... do people still do that?

I’m honestly curious, because I do take people’s anecdotes seriously (keeping in mind that brains are fuzzy with perception and memory fills the gaps), and I still tend to take someone at their word. Lately I’m noticing how naive that is, and how much people take advantage of it.

Why don’t we hold them accountable? Are we tolerating so much that we end up doing a kind of “peaceful violence”? I’m not calling for witch hunts or anything, but surely we can do better than whatever is happening now.

Take the congressional hearing, for example: if there’s strong evidence someone lied, publicly we should at least be able to say, “Your statements are not credible for the time being.” How do you come back from that? I don’t know.

Take YouTube videos nowadays: clickbait titles and exaggerated facial expressions in thumbnails just to grab attention. If the video doesn’t actually deliver on the premise of the title, it should be reported as misleading, regardless of the “this video was made for entertainment” disclaimer. That attitude is bleeding into so many areas of life. Language and words are becoming a joke, and over time people get used to it and copy the same behavior.

I guess my point is: why is someone’s word no longer taken seriously (if it ever really was)? And why don’t we hold people accountable?