More Old-School Thinking

The very first step towards the management of disease was replacement of demon theories and humours theories by germ theory. That very step, the beginning of hope, in itself dashed all hopes of magical solutions. It told workers that progress would be made stepwise, at great effort, and that a persistent, unremitting care would have to be paid to a discipline of cleanliness. So it is with software engineering today.

Fred Brooks, No Silver Bullet - Essence and Accident in Software Engineering