Alex WellersteinVerified account

But the overall, cumulative effect is that tacit knowledge requirements can drop in general in a field, narrowing the kind of expertise. If it maps very closely onto a fully open field, then it ceases to be a very effective barrier to proliferation.

("narrowing the kind of expertise *required*," it should say.)

Which is just to say: the tacit knowledge "fetishists" tend to act like tacit knowledge is an effective barrier. I think history and sociology of science has shown us that, at best, it slows things down a bit. At worst, it can vanish overnight (e.g., with new instruments/tools).

(And again, to highlight what I mean by the effect of instruments/tools: I can teach undergrads with no coding experience how to make something like the NUKEMAP in about 4 mos. That is because tools+APIs+browsers+etc. have changed. Would have been impossible to do 20 years ago.)

(Doesn't mean tacit knowledge — experience and judgment, for example — doesn't exist. But it can be *dramatically* reduced as a barrier to entry to a given field/technical skill/etc.)

Yes, totally agree with you, and if someone truly thinks tacit knowledge is some kind of perpetually effective proliferation barrier you have my permission to laugh at them :).

The need for tacit knowledge never goes away. But tech. change does seem to diminish its role systematically. Eg., CNC vs hand-machining.

Which tho dropping it doesn’t remove need for skilled practice and is only one part of an overall system of processes of articulating various skilled & automated material tasks into a useful “WMD”