Indeed, "brute force" solutions are often characteristic of advanced
cultures, not primitive ones. The Romans and their predecessors spent a long
time figuring out how to build arches... and virtually all our buildings
today use post-and-lintel construction, precisely what the arch was devised
to replace. We have better materials and more money, and given that, arches
are usually not worth the extra complexity.
-- Henry Spencer
Related:
brute force adj.
Describes a primitive programming style
one in which the programmer relies on the computer's processing
power instead of using his or her own intelligence to simplify the
problem, often ignoring problems of scale and applying naive
methods suited to small problems directly to large ones....