3 ms·
Nothing wrong with looking at nature and trying to get inspiration from it (e.g. neural nets) but ever since we realized that flight was easier to implement wit
by kmiroslav 10y ago
Nothing wrong with looking at nature and trying to get inspiration from it (e.g. neural nets) but ever since we realized that flight was easier to implement with chemical combustion than by flapping wings, we know that just because something works in nature doesn't mean it will be easy to replicate for human use.
- huuu 10y agoTrue. But because as today it's easier to implement doesn't mean we won't have aircraft with flapping wings in the future.
- jdmichal 10y agoWe probably won't, at least not at human-scale and not on Earth. Flapping wings don't scale; there's a reason you have to get to #12 of the heaviest birds list to get one that flies, at ~13% the maximum mass of the heaviest bird. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_birds#Table_of_heaviest_living_birds https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_largest_birds#Table_of...
- DigitalJack 10y agoI wonder where pterodactyls would fall on that scale.
- jdmichal 10y agoLooks like Wikipedia has us covered: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterosaur_size#Speculation_about_pterosaur_size_and_flight https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pterosaur_size#Speculation_abo... From the references, this is a pretty good read: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-pterosaurs-first-took-flight/ http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-pterosaurs-fir...