10/16/2024
After a wonderful talk with Michael Larsen , I do feel compelled to make a statement. That is to say, something like this:
I got into testing at least four reasons. First, it was fun. Second, I knew over time I could become good at it. Third, it has the least false incentives; of the jobs in software I could see at the time, it was the least likely to punish me for doing my job well. Finally, the job involved the pursuit of truth. One person says the software will release today end of day, another, without doing any investigation, claims "it works." The tester says: "We'll see about that."
That's a big part of my life. The pursuit of truth.
Look, I'm not claiming to be perfect. I screw up in a lot of ways, all the time. I can be arrogant, I can be jerk. But if you know me professionally, I never lied to you, and try to be accountable when my errors are pointed out to me.
That is what I see testing as - the pursuit of truth.
So when I see AI claims that don't correspond to truth, where the speaker seems to be disinterested in the concept of truth -- it offends me as a software tester.
This reminds me, more than a bit, of the old Seinfeld joke.
Jerry is offended by Jewish jokes.
