What makes someone an expert is often not only their skill, but their experience. This includes knowing what shortcuts to take, when, and why, and what shortcuts to avoid.
Being an expert can also include knowing what basic requirements of success are absolutely essential, but are often lost in the details. Or, they know how often the forest gets missed for the trees.
I just finished reading the book Couture Sewing Techniques, Revised and Updated by Shaeffer. Do I intend to make a couture garment? Not any time soon. Do I intend to buy a couture garment? Not unless I have a lot more money than I have now. Did I learn anything useful? I sure did. Among other things, I learned some things about how shirts and jackets are supposed to fit when they fit correctly. I learned some things about making pockets.
The biggest thing I learned was why that level of tailoring and dressmaking costs so much: it’s not because of all the handwork, but because the handwork is combined with expertise in appearance and construction to make garments which are comfortable to wear and really flatter the wearer.
The word “technology” can apply almost any skill or craft. From the Online Etymology Dictionary, the etymology of technology:
technology (n.)
D. Harper. “Etymology of technology.” Online Etymology Dictionary. https://www.etymonline.com/word/technology (accessed November 22, 2022).
1610s, “a discourse or treatise on an art or the arts,” from Latinized form of Greek tekhnologia “systematic treatment of an art, craft, or technique,” originally referring to grammar, from tekhno-, combining form of tekhnē “art, skill, craft in work; method, system, an art, a system or method of making or doing,” . . .
For the purposes of this blog, I usually use “technology” to mean electrical, electronic, or computer technology.
But there lots of fields, lots of “art, craft, or technique” which have varying levels of skill and expertise. It’s still a human creating something. And the end user of the created thing is usually a human.