As programmers and as engineers, we often seek objective metrics to judge the value of things, neglecting aesthetic value and value that cannot easily be reduced to objective metrics.
This accessible paper reminds us that reasoning is not dispassionate and that we should attend to aesthetic matters as well.
The paper itself is in the context of education and seeks how to convey to students the importance and value of a subject matter.
I like having greater content area by default, and the text next to an icon in the Gmail Android app is nice too. (The spam button, with its explanation mark, could easily be mistaken for an important button otherwise.)
It's one of the reasons I prefer how Vim and VS Code look over Intellij and Visual Studio standard. Let me better see what I'm focusing on without distractions (the content) instead of shoving a gazillion buttons on your UI in the default view.
Edit: I was too harsh about Intellij I think. The old UI I was thinking of doesn't look bad in my opinion, but I still think I would have enjoyed my experience with Visual Studio more if it had a stronger focus on content (the code) visually.
I remember, as a child, having fun with a Yoshi (from Mario) fangame that pretended like he was in Windows 95/98. It might have been this one. https://youtu.be/AwZfivyZ20c?t=184
This accessible paper reminds us that reasoning is not dispassionate and that we should attend to aesthetic matters as well.
The paper itself is in the context of education and seeks how to convey to students the importance and value of a subject matter.