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rec.bicycles.tech, rec.bicycles.misc, rec.bicycles.soc
THE DESTRUCTIVE CERTAINTY OF THE UGLY ENGINEER
by Andre Jute The quoted text below is from a thread on "Planetary Hubs Reaction Torque". My contribution to the technical subject stands in that thread. Here I want to talk about the attitudes of engineers, and have therefore snipped the *technical* details to leave only the revealing attitudes. The sequence thus far. Someone asks a question about torque arms on hub gearboxes. I give him a comprehensive and correct reply. Clive George, possibly trying to make a clumsy joke, gives him clearly wrong facts. Jobst Brandt then quotes Clive George in full without correcting him, after which Brandt goes off on a tangent that has almost nothing to do with the question and is in addition obscurely phrased. At this point, I twit Brandt for his glaring assumption that anything he says, however irrelevant, is a pearl of wisdom, and for overlooking, in his rush to impress us with esoteric knowledge, the factual errors George made: Jute: Gee, Jobst, you should have been a high school teacher: you can make doubtful relevance and outright irrelevance into an art form. "jim beam" then chimes in: masterful understatement. Jute: That the art form is egotism shouldn't disturb you. Meanwhile, while you were stroking your own, you let the Welsh git get away with some gross errors. You're slipping, man. We expect better vigilance from you. "jim beam" then reproaches me for even expecting better from Brandt. I've snipped the technical detail to leave only the destructive and intolerant attitudes which (I hasten to add, lest anyone think I'm kicking "jim beam" in the gonads for daring to contradict me a few weeks ago, and for not apologizing when he was repeatedly proved wrong) are shared by Brandt and a lot of other techies everywhere on the net, not just on RBT. This is a pot and kettle situation between rival ugly techies. "jim beam": how can you expect "better" from a guy that could never get it right in the first place??? timmy mcnamara's recent regurgitation of jobstian misunderstanding of [snip techie stuff] . if the great and mighty jobst brandt had stayed awake in class, and ever had the ability to think analytically, consideration of [snip techie stuff] would have allowed him to grasp reality. instead, we have a sad misconception polluting the knowledge pool, not only because of failure, but because of ego refusing to actually do the only thing [he?] ever claimed to support - get competent technical peer review. **** Engineers are, generally speaking, and even today amid the general decline of first class education in the West, among the most intelligent and intensively educated members of society. Unfortunately they are also self-selecting from among the ugliest people in society, to the extent that when Time Magazine asked "Why are engineers the ugliest people in society?", hardly anyone was outraged at what elsewhere would have been stereotyping. We needn't go into that further. Here I want to discuss only one, very unhelpful by-product of the way engineers are educated, which then reinforces the arrogance with which they start out, which arrogance is itself further intensified by the elite attitudes extant in every engineering school I've ever observed. Engineering is applied physics. Engineers therefore have their heads crammed full of facts to the exclusion of almost anything else, certainly culture and even good manners. Because of the (probably necessary) emphasis on hard, provable and useful facts, most engineers even have a poor grasp of fundamental hypothetical scientific tests, at the level where it is as useful to disprove your thesis as to prove it. Such engineers as ever do development work are almost always trying to prove something practical, and regard disproof as a failure of the knowledge by which the hypothesis was constructed. In short, engineers are guys who know things, and who pride themselves on knowing things to the exclusion of almost everything else. It is therefore not surprising that some of them come to believe that they know everything and should not be contradicted on any subject they condescend to speak on. (Brandt's ideas of the civic duties of the police vis a vis cyclists are absolutely hilarious -- and very dangerous for cyclists.) Let me say that again for the shorter attention spans: engineers, and more generally the more esoteric techies too, are people who know things, and who pride themselves on knowing things to the exclusion of almost everything else. Things are physical, eh? From this it follows in time, during which the bonds of engineering as the applied physics of things are loosened from the mothership of physics as universal *ideas* of cause and effect to be proved or misproved, that engineers in practice say nothing until they believe they can make a definitive statement on some subject. Having made what they believe is a definitive statement, they then take it as a personal and professional affront to have that "definitive" statement questioned. Ask yourself, how often have you heard any alpha engineer say, "I may be wrong, this may only be a wild idea, but..." You haven't, because an engineer who behaved so much outside the bounds of professional propriety (in this case read "in-your-face certainty") will soon lose the respect of his peers. **** All of this is pretty tiresome and counterproductive. As I pointed out, and forced Jobst to admit, there is error, or at the very least a misleading statement, that has been allowed to stand in his book "The Bicycle Wheel" through umpteen editions and reprints. The key thing isn't the error -- I shall return to its relative insignificance in the scheme of things -- but the stubborn refusal to admit even the possibility of error. Contrast the way everyone else works. When I write a book it is subject to review by several kinds of editors even if it is a novel. If it is a non-fiction book it is subject to peer review. If none the less an error slips through and is pointed out to me by a reader, I say polite thanks and correct it in the next edition. Thus, knowledge is improved by steps. No guilt attaches to errors unless caused by negligence; blame is not distributed. I say again, that is not the engineering way. For engineers it is all or nothing. What they say is perfect (and complete) or they aren't supposed to say it. **** Jobst therefore views his book as a final statement, by definition incontestible. I (an economist and psychologist and artist) view Jobst's book as a framework of more or less believable facts and *opinions*, a good start on knowledge. I'm less concerned with the error I've proved (and I proved it so easily when others failed for years simply because I don't really care whether I'm right and Jobst wrong) than that there should be discussion to discover whether there are alternative credible views for the uncommited, non-partisan to try. "jim beam", some kind of a specialist metallurgist, sees what bothers me in Jobst's book as an error without any shading of opinion. More, for him a single error condemns the entire book -- and the author. This is just the flipside of Jobst's own opinion, that knowledge on any subject is either perfect or it is nothing. Both the Brandt view and the "beam" view are engineering views. Both undermine the furtherance of knowledge. Both are counterproductive to the spread of knowledge. Both are ugly obsessions. Neither has any place in a hobby or in polite society. **** Humans are fallible even if engineers claim not to be. That is what gives too many engineers their appearance of inhumanity. In fact, as we know, and common sense should tell even those without close acquaintance with engineers, engineers are fallible too. Human fallibility, expressed as the incompleteness of knowledge, is the engine of progress. **** The engineers among my friends, mostly from automobiles, are thoughtful, humane and cultured. But, if you think on it, they would be, wouldn't they? It is just another form of natural selection that my engineers are beautiful minds and yours are ugly -- because you let them be. Andre Jute Charisma is the talent of infuriating the undeserving by merely existing elegantly Visit Jute on Bicycles at http://www.audio-talk.co.uk/fiultra/...20CYCLING.html Copyright 2009 Andre Jute |
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#2
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rec.bicycles.tech, rec.bicycles.misc, rec.bicycles.soc
Andre Jute wrote:
- much snip- I (an economist and psychologist and artist) ... Actual advanced degree in economics or a dilettante (like me) ? -- Andrew Muzi www.yellowjersey.org/ Open every day since 1 April, 1971 |
#3
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rec.bicycles.tech, rec.bicycles.misc, rec.bicycles.soc
A Muzi wrote:
:: Andre Jute wrote: :: - much snip- ::: I (an economist and psychologist and artist) ... :: :: :: Actual advanced degree in economics or a dilettante (like me) ? :: -- :: Andrew Muzi :: www.yellowjersey.org/ :: Open every day since 1 April, 1971 He also blows smoke. Pat |
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