I wonder if my profession, as obsessed as it is with tradition, nullifies my worst neophilic tendencies. Hm. Neither here nor there.

(Which is not to say I’m not subject to being swayed by new shiny, because I am, all the dang time.)

When it comes to creation of new concepts or new packaging of existing concepts, though, I think my professional training allows me to see those things as equivalents. If I know a judge will accept a certain argument, either because they are bound by precedent or because I’ve seen them do it before, then structuring a novel argument in a way that analogizes or parallels the known quantity is a huge advantage! So that’s equally-as-good as coming up with a novel argument that is equally persuasive, maybe better, because it is often less work.