Re #2, I'm not a programmer, but as a writer I find the same thing to be true. I work better with a pen and legal pad than a keyboard.
I've got this feeling that we have neural pathways built for typing and, subconsciously, we favor phrases, words, and sentences that are easy to type. I know I even have a tic where if I pause to think I'll insert extraneous commas.
It's kind of like how musicians tend to improvise around licks and scales that they have practiced a lot. There's something to thinking about the idea of a song on paper that is more creative than unintentionally falling back on chords/forms that are easy to play. (Adam Neely discusses this very well here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6c_LeIXrzAk)
Wouldn't the same be try of a pen and paper, though? We would be subconsciously favoring words that are easy to write?
I have horrible handwriting and am a VERY slow writer (and my hand gets cramped after writing a few words). I know whenever I have to write something by hand, I tend to choose small words and short sentences. On the other hand, I am a very fast typist and can type faster than I can think in most cases, so I tend to be much more verbose.
It is a valid point, for sure. My handwriting is nice and easy for me (a point of pride, actually), so I can definitely see being biased toward it.
I can definitely type faster than I think, though. So my hands always end up in this kind fo wait() loop while my brain processes. Sometimes, I look back at my previous sentences and realized that my hands kept going for a while before by brain even bothered to stop them. I guess I don't have that problem as much with pens.
I think part of the advantage of paper is that it rewards you for making up useful abstractions and inventing notation on the fly, so that you don't have to write things out. On paper, you don't get red squiggles if you're using something that's not properly defined elsewhere, and there's no penalty for using a symbol that's compact but hard to type.
I've got this feeling that we have neural pathways built for typing and, subconsciously, we favor phrases, words, and sentences that are easy to type. I know I even have a tic where if I pause to think I'll insert extraneous commas.
It's kind of like how musicians tend to improvise around licks and scales that they have practiced a lot. There's something to thinking about the idea of a song on paper that is more creative than unintentionally falling back on chords/forms that are easy to play. (Adam Neely discusses this very well here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6c_LeIXrzAk)