I agree that most of us are prone to over-detailing pointless things. My favorite examples was "Scouts" star system generation, which would churn out a list of all 74 chunks of airless rubble in a system that the characters would never, ever care about.
That being said, sometimes quantified details suddenly matter a lot. My favorite from an actual game: "Can our ship use its drives to push a neighboring ship 50 meters across the landing apron without damaging either ship badly?" You can wing an answer, but then you're stuck being consistent with that answer when the players get similarly creative in a new situation. Too many arbitrary and inconsistent rulings from the GM breaks suspension of disbelief and discourages creative problem solving by the players.
Game style
That being said, sometimes quantified details suddenly matter a lot. My favorite from an actual game: "Can our ship use its drives to push a neighboring ship 50 meters across the landing apron without damaging either ship badly?" You can wing an answer, but then you're stuck being consistent with that answer when the players get similarly creative in a new situation. Too many arbitrary and inconsistent rulings from the GM breaks suspension of disbelief and discourages creative problem solving by the players.
It's a thin tightrope.