Brooks suggesting a move from "build" to "grow" as the key metaphor in software development

build-to-grow-no-silver-bullet-snip.txt

In "No Silver Bullet" [1] Brooks wrote in 1986:

"I still remember the jolt I felt in 1958 when I first heard a friend talk about building a program,
as opposed to writing one. In a flash he broadened my whole view of the software process. The 
metaphor shift was powerful, and accurate. Today we understand how like other building processes the
construction of software is, and we freely use other elements of the metaphor, such as 
specifications, assembly of components, and scaffolding."

"The building metaphor has outlived its usefulness. It is time to change again. If, as I believe, 
the conceptual structures we construct today are too complicated to be specified accurately in 
advance, and too complex to be built faultlessly, then we must take a radically different 
approach."

"Let us turn nature and study complexity in living things, instead of just the dead works of man. 
Here we find constructs whose complexities thrill us with awe. The brain alone is intricate beyond 
mapping, powerful beyond imitation, rich in diversity, self-protecting, and selfrenewing. The secret 
is that it is grown, not built."

[1] http://worrydream.com/refs/Brooks-NoSilverBullet.pdf