The number of professional engineers we have is vastly too small to make good use of the enormous power that computers have handed us in the last 20 years.
I see our options as: a) be condescending dicks every time a novice makes a novice mistake, b) leave enormous amounts of technical value untapped until professionals can get around to it, or c) use our professional engineering smarts to build tools that amateur engineers can succeed with. I favor C.
I pick a combination of (a) and (d). If someone does something dangerous and stupid we have to snap out of our predisposition to feel sorry for them. Ridicule is fine. As long as you then tell them how not to make the mistake again and why it was bad. When I blew up the fume cupboard at school due to a hydrogen gas explosion I didn't receive or deserve any sympathy but I apologised to those who were showered with glass :)
Option (d) which you missed is not to build them tools but teach them how the universe works and give them the knowledge of how to make their own tools.
Any fucker can stick an LED in arduino with a series resistor picked from a web form. However when someone gets the IV curve, the difference is remarkable.
A2) Point out mistakes to share the benefit of your experience.
The problem is that people have a real hard time distinguishing between A1 and A2, and this drives a lot of people to say that we shouldn't even try for A2, and just try to build stuff so people can learn from our experience without the troublesome burden of communicating with us.
Good point. I think A2 can be distinguished from A1 if the writer is willing to put in a little work. Some of the best lessons I learned were from people saying, "Oh, yeah, I made a mistake like that once. Here's how I think about it now. And let me tell you the story of an even bigger mistake I made."
But that sort of compassionate oral tradition only takes us so far. The number of people who will ever approach the level of a professional engineer is small. I think if we want to squeeze the full value out of digital technology, it's going to have to be approachable to the non-expert. Being compassionate in discussion can help there, but I think it's even more important to be compassionate in construction.
Comments
The number of professional engineers we have is vastly too small to make good use of the enormous power that computers have handed us in the last 20 years.
I see our options as: a) be condescending dicks every time a novice makes a novice mistake, b) leave enormous amounts of technical value untapped until professionals can get around to it, or c) use our professional engineering smarts to build tools that amateur engineers can succeed with. I favor C.
The LHC disagrees with you...
I pick a combination of (a) and (d). If someone does something dangerous and stupid we have to snap out of our predisposition to feel sorry for them. Ridicule is fine. As long as you then tell them how not to make the mistake again and why it was bad. When I blew up the fume cupboard at school due to a hydrogen gas explosion I didn't receive or deserve any sympathy but I apologised to those who were showered with glass :)
Option (d) which you missed is not to build them tools but teach them how the universe works and give them the knowledge of how to make their own tools.
Any fucker can stick an LED in arduino with a series resistor picked from a web form. However when someone gets the IV curve, the difference is remarkable.
There are really two versions of A:
A1) Be assholes.
A2) Point out mistakes to share the benefit of your experience.
The problem is that people have a real hard time distinguishing between A1 and A2, and this drives a lot of people to say that we shouldn't even try for A2, and just try to build stuff so people can learn from our experience without the troublesome burden of communicating with us.
Good point. I think A2 can be distinguished from A1 if the writer is willing to put in a little work. Some of the best lessons I learned were from people saying, "Oh, yeah, I made a mistake like that once. Here's how I think about it now. And let me tell you the story of an even bigger mistake I made."
But that sort of compassionate oral tradition only takes us so far. The number of people who will ever approach the level of a professional engineer is small. I think if we want to squeeze the full value out of digital technology, it's going to have to be approachable to the non-expert. Being compassionate in discussion can help there, but I think it's even more important to be compassionate in construction.