I was trained as an experimental physicist, where I learned to write software for a real-time computer converting analog information into digital information and doing the signal processing, looking for clues in the underlying processes in the lab.
An example of the different views of the world between Experimentalist and Theorist goes like this
The Fine Structure constant, that describes the way charged particle interact with each other is know by observation to be 7.2973525698 x 10-3. There is no theory that can explain why that number should be that value. It's just what is measured.
Richard Feynman has a good quote for this type of problem...
A good theoretical physicist put this number up on the wall and worries it's one of the greatest mysteries of physics - a magic number that comes with no understanding of why.
In our project management world, we must have a reason for why we are doing what we are doing. Without that why - the Immutable Principles - we are just spending other people's money with a low probability of success. From my experimental physics background, it's required we have a reason for doing what we are doing. And why that practice produces the outcomes we need to increase the probability of project success.
