You have spent 40 years making sure you have never needed to do something creative. Whenever there have been open issues, you have stopped working until some one else have pointed you in the right direction.

That is not the way to move the world forward. Just the way to again, and again, build new wheels.

You think someone with money is a fool if they ask a developer to create something for him. Would it be better for that person (who might actually be a genious in other areas) did fumble himself trying to write 100 page of specifications and they order: "build this"? Possibly getting a seriously broken product because the developer blindly followed the specification without pointing out the problems?

You have located a sub-box of the development process, and decided to call that box your home. That is fine. But at the same time, you are trying to order everyone else to redefine "development" into being equivalent with that sub-box, and to consider everything outside it as lunacy.

Many customers don't want a radio. They want a better radio. But marketing can't magically help them make a better radio. Very often, it takes a development process. Many developers are actually liking working with that part of development - figuring out what limitations old radios have had, and how technology changes or different views can be used to redefine a radio.

It wasn't marketing that changed a hammer into a nail gun. And the ones who did improve a hammer into a nail gun - or spent the money - were not fools. Marketing didn't magically specified a pen that writes under water, and then they had such a pen. How could marketing have specified a LED lamp, before someone did invent the LED, and did manage to improve it enough that someone got interested in using it?

Many customers really do come and say: I have this product. It's outdated - or some of the components are. How can you replace it with something new? It needs to match the old requirements, so we have a replacement product for current buyers. But we would very much like to know how it can be improved, to allow us to also interest new buyers. Such a customer isn't a fool. A fool does what he hasn't the skill to do. A clever person knows his limitations and tries to buy that competence.

Of course, it's safer to just follow order. Implement the 10000 lines of code that does exactly what a specification says it should do. But it is much more rewarding trying to help a customer figure out how an existing product or idea could be improved upon. Being good at that, also gives repeat customers. Because customers who buys that help really are not fools. They value, and pay for, good advice.