We infantilize ourselves Here in the US, we expect government and law to be our conscience. Our superego, you could say. It has something to do with liberal individualism, and something to do with capitalism, but I don't understand much of the theoretical aspect—what I see is what I live in. Americans are in a way crazy. We infantilize ourselves. We don't think of ourselves as citizens—parts of something larger to which we have profound responsibilities. We think of ourselves as citizens when it comes to our rights and privileges, but not our responsibilities. We abdicate our civic responsibilities to the government and expect the government, in effect, to legislate morality. David Foster Wallace, The Pale King societygovernmentpoliticsmoralitycivics
Complete and consistent requirements An architect who needs complete and consistent requirements to begin work, though perhaps a brilliant builder, is not an architect. Mark W. Maier & Eberhardt Rechtin, The Art of Systems Architecting What the problem isThe heart of systems engineeringA late change in requirements is a competitive advantage architecturedesign