> I’m partial to a different interpretation, that’s more like “go doesn’t require as much thinking as Haskell, so you can use your thinking for the problem you’re trying to solve instead of the language”.

I think you're being too charitable here. Rob Pike is a very smart and articulate guy. If he had wanted to say "go doesn’t require as much thinking as Haskell, so you can use your thinking for the problem you’re trying to solve instead of the language", then he would have. Instead he took a dig at google employees. Make of that what you will, but I don't think it's case of him mean anything other than exactly what he said.