Jihad needs scientists
in [Design]
|
From: lucasea on 19 Oct 2006 15:19 "T Wake" <usenet.es7at(a)gishpuppy.com> wrote in message news:XoWdnbu9n5IeO6rYnZ2dnUVZ8tCdnZ2d(a)pipex.net... > > "JoeBloe" <joebloe(a)thebarattheendoftheuniverse.org> wrote in message > news:6tmej2de9dsdrjde78h5i25fd0uqfq1oku(a)4ax.com... > >> The US is the most diverse melting pot of race, religion, creed, >> and culture in the world. > > Yes. Of course. Well, OK, will you accept that we're at least the most jingoistic? :^) Eric Lucas
From: Jonathan Kirwan on 19 Oct 2006 15:44 On Thu, 19 Oct 2006 16:42:33 +0100, "T Wake" <usenet.es7at(a)gishpuppy.com> wrote: ><snip> >> And a *few* ppl are now waking up to the fact that service industries >> don't >> invent things ! > >When more than a few people wake up to this, I will be happier. The problem driving the change in the us towards service and away from knowing how to design and make things is fundamental and won't go away with some realization. People already realize it. The problem is capsulized in the experiences of a certain company I was involved with as a contractor, back in the 1980s. They were developing the very first rewritable CDROM -- before they existed, in fact. Ph.D. polymer chemists and optical physicists and various other specialties, including engineers, were working out all the details required to make practical what we now take for granted. From my perspective, they had everything worked out very well. In fact, they were getting close enough to a product. There was one remaining fundamental problem and that was the time it took to erase. They knew they had to improve that time substantially. But they had several lines to follow there that worked in the lab and no one doubted they would resolve it for manufacturability. No one I met there, anyway. It would take a year, perhaps less, to work out a real solution. (At that time, by the way, the CD plastic plates were about a penny each in large quantities and the polymer layers added another 5 cents, or so.) It turns out that the method used in pratical writable CDs _would be_ their technique, and they had a number of key patents on it. However, the investors had already pumped in a lot of money and they were already 3 years deep into the project, and were asking for another year or so to finalize. Early expectations given to them by the PhD types had been more like 2-2.5 years "max" and the investors decided to abort the project rather than go for another year and see. They fired everyone except one person, someone technical enough to understand their patents and to help them sell them and also shop around for other technical companies' products. They decided not to be a manufacturer, but instead a patent broker and a seller of others' products. I actually got some of my better tools from the sale of that company when it went "out of business." A 6 1/2 digit HP multimeter, a nice 10mW HeNe Melles Griot laser, a couple of 25mW tunable Argons, and some other nice optical tools and stuff. (When they did a little internal auction of sorts.) Part of this is that few are honestly focused on long term, anymore. They cannot well afford to be. Too many things change too quickly. The high and fluctuating interest rates of the late 1970's forced a lot of companies to shorten up their focus a lot and they haven't had reason to change back, since then. Everything is about the here and now and very little looks to the long term (which can be anything more than a year or two, depending on area, it seems like.) Certainly, I've not seen any "real" business planning going past 5 years and I hear people laughing in the hallways about even that much. Service businesses are much more "aligned" with this short term mentality. R&D is very hard to come by and building up manufacturing knowledge and skill takes time and often substantial capital assets. Having investors with this kind of long term approach is like finding hens' teeth. Rare. Now, I'm talking about the US so far. Worldwide, there is still a serious need for products and products will be made and companies will develop them. But the equilibrium point within the US has shifted well over into the service sector while I've been an observer and, for the US, I don't think that is healthy. I think people already know the local problems. The question is, "What can we do about it?" How to effect a change within the US, for example, that will encourage investment in product development knowledge instead of a shift towards service here? (That is, of course, if we can decide it's worth keeping the skills.) Jon
From: Jonathan Kirwan on 19 Oct 2006 15:48 On Thu, 19 Oct 2006 19:01:16 +0100, Eeyore <rabbitsfriendsandrelations(a)hotmail.com> wrote: >T Wake wrote: > >> "John Larkin" <jjlarkin(a)highNOTlandTHIStechnologyPART.com> wrote >> > On Wed, 18 Oct 2006 20:56:56 +0100, "T Wake" >> > <usenet.es7at(a)gishpuppy.com> wrote: >> > >> >>One thing I find odd, is that you don't think DNA/RNA mutation and >> >>evolution >> >>is amazing and wonderful in itself. Isn't it amazing how four bases can >> >>produce such variety? >> > >> > The four bases are a programming language. The *programs* and their >> > high-level structure will turn out to be astonishing in their own >> > right. >> >> It is already astonishing that ACGT can spell out a human and a fruit fly. >> The analogy of a programming language may be accurate, and is certainly >> attractive, but answers nothing. > >But how the heck do individual cells know what to turn into ? Chemical signals in their local environment. For example, we have a close chemical analog in humans to spiders, I remember reading about, that leads/signals the direction of development of our spinal column and other nervous tissue. Chemicals are the means by which cells communicate with each other, so to speak, or trigger differentiation. But I'm ignorant about the details. So I'll stop here. Jon
From: Jonathan Kirwan on 19 Oct 2006 15:52 On Thu, 19 Oct 2006 18:26:44 +0100, "T Wake" <usenet.es7at(a)gishpuppy.com> wrote: > >"Michael A. Terrell" <mike.terrell(a)earthlink.net> wrote in message >news:45379C79.FAA049BF(a)earthlink.net... >> Lloyd Parker wrote: >>> >>> In article <45376EAA.AF2F3DBB(a)earthlink.net>, >>> "Michael A. Terrell" <mike.terrell(a)earthlink.net> wrote: >>> >Lloyd Parker wrote: >>> >> >>> >> Why then would a designer make every life form use almost the same >>> >> DNA? >>> Why >>> >> have a flower have the same basic DNA as a human? >>> > >>> > >>> > Because that designer knows his tools, and how to use them. Do you >>> >think that a bridge should be made of plastic, because steel had been >>> >used for cars that will cross it? >>> >>> Would you design a bridge with the same basic structure as, say, a pair >>> of >>> shoes if you were starting from scratch? >> >> >> We are talking building blocks. Steel is used in both, as are >> synthetic materials for cushioning. >> >> >>> > Do you think a designer should learn a whole new disciple for every >>> >project they do? Maybe we need an infinite number of elements so we >>> >never use the same in any two designs? >>> > >>> > >>> >>> I would think an infinite god would have introduced a little variety into >>> his >>> designs. >> >> He doesn't have to do what you want, he did what he wanted. If the >> DNA wasn't similar, where would the proteins you need come from? > >He could make them up any way he wanted. This points up the problem of arguing design. We have no idea what a designer would or would not do/use. So until we develop a theory of such design, there is no way we can recognize such design as being design. We wouldn't know it if it hit us in the face, right now. We just don't have the perspective. Jon
From: lucasea on 19 Oct 2006 16:34
> "JoeBloe" <joebloe(a)thebarattheendoftheuniverse.org> wrote in message > news:jrlej2d7jucm71sc7juj3kufmlsk1knork(a)4ax.com... > >> Then, we started the industrial revolution. Actually....no. From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Industrial_revolution: "The debate about the start of the Industrial Revolution also concerns the massive lead that Britain had over other countries." The Industrial Revolution is widely acknowledged to have started in England around the 1760s, with the start of migration of farm workers to and the mechanization of factories--the first of which were probably the textile mills. Watt's steam engine around 1770 was a major enabling development. At that time, we weren't yet even a country, and certainly had little or no industry. The IR didn't migrate to the US until sometime later in the 19th century. DuPont set up his gunpowder factory in the early 1800s, and that was probably one of the earliest US industrial concerns. Fascinating tour, if you're ever in Wilmington, DE. Interestingly, Leominster, England was a focal point for the mechanization of the textile industry in England. That's interesting because Leominster/Fitchburg, Massachusetts was the center of the US textile industry from about 1850 until its decline after WWII and offshoring to the Far East. One might assume that the coincidence was due to textile companies moving from Leominster, England to Massachusetts and setting up company a town named after their home in England, but that's apparently not the case. Leominster, MA was settled, fully established and incorporated long before the IR hit the US. But, please, don't let a little data stand in the way of your jingoism. Eric Lucas |