hmmmm never have i thought about turning syntax off... do you also turn off autocomplete?
It wasn't intentionally by choice, I remember getting frustrated with some interaction between a couple of plugins and resolved to start from a clean slate and carefully configure and curate my config. The clean slate happened but the subsequent configuration never did. I got used to it pretty quickly and it forced me to keep more of the code base in my mental RAM at any point in time.
That still resulted in quite a bit of hunting around, slower refactors but I was thinking about the code quite a bit more. I finally started using a much more feature rich environment and while I'm glad I did the long stretch without it, I even feel I benefited from it, I don't think I could go back.
For autocompletes specifically I do find the immediate suggestions annoying even when I can type right through them. I have no idea how people work when they have to pause their coding to actively dismiss suggestions either via the mouse or through a keyboard shortcut.
For the time being my autocomplete suggestion window is a key combination to even display for a single instance and no additional actions need to be taken unless I want to accept the suggestion (I can still type right through it). I'm sure everyone's mileage will vary but autocomplete feels significantly more intrusive to me than syntax highlighting.
[†]: Obviously this isn't actually random, it's just hitting a key which tab-completes when I don't expect it to. But it feels random and takes me out of flow.
Syntax highlighting, on the other hand, I was memed into trying to code without it, and I hated it. I suspect, like many things, there are a minority of neurotypes for whom turning it off is better, and a majority who prefer it for good reason.
Autocompletion doesn't need to be braindead. Unix terminals have had it for decades, and I have never seen anybody complain.
Probably because you don't see the autocomplete there unless you specifically ask for it. This is a world apart from editors that automatically pop up autocomplete options. Those are an unwelcome distraction.
If Unix shells behaved like that, I'd strenuously object.
I wouldn't go so far as "brain-dead", but it is an annoyance, because I am looking at the screen when I am typing, and the lines below and lines above are context that I can easily retriever without needing to store them in my head.
When the autocomplete window pops up it obscures the context above and below the line I am on, and in turn my context switches instantly from (for example) "Use the results of the previous operation as a parameter to this function" to "what was the name of the variable that I used for 'results' on the previous line? I can no longer see the previous line".
For me, I think, an autocomplete would be best if displayed off to the side, in a consistent spot that never changes. Maybe reserve a small box on the right hand side of the editing window for things that constantly change on every keystroke.
This has the advantage of being able to ignore it, and only switch my gaze (and hence my context) when I actually want to read what it is displaying.