[qznc]

> There are two main schools of thought in software development about how to build really big, complicated stuff.

That feels like a straw man to me. This is not a binary question. For each small design decision you have a choice about how much uncertainty you accept.

There are no "two schools". There is at least a spectrum between two extremes and no real project was ever at either of the very ends of it. Actually, I don't think spectrum is a proper word even because this is not just a single dimension. For example, speed and risk often correlate but they are also somewhat independent and sometimes they anti-correlate.