[phobosanomaly]

I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that the database guy actually implements things in an environment that can be manipulated at will.

Doctors don't implement things in an environment that they control. Patients come to them with a chief complaint, and the doctor tries to resolve or manage it to the best of their ability with a minimal intervention according to a set of guidelines someone else wrote down.

A doctor can't sit there and play with the diagnostic/treatment process in the same way a database guy can go play with the database software. At best the doctor can sit there with a textbook or medical journal and try to memorize more facts, or take notes, but it's not the same as pulling apart code, running it in different ways, and seeing how it behaves.

Medical school is a continuous process of memorizing shit off of flash cards culled from a textbook. You don't actually build anything, or implement anything, or do anything in a real-world sense that would make you an expert in the same way as someone who was working with a system that they were able to take apart and play with and manipulate. There's no real way to develop the kind of deep knowledge you're talking about in that environment.

A diesel mechanic can pull apart and engine. Hold every part in their hand. Drive a diesel-engine vehicle. Observe all the things that go wrong. Simulate, and innovate. An individual doctor can't really do any of that. Medical schools are even axing dissections, so med students are lucky if they get to see what the hell peritoneum actually looks like.