7 ms·

On one hand it's nice to see the valley: 'let's solve this' attitude. On the other hand, it's common to see them blinded by hubris, resulting in problem solving

by lingz 8y ago

On one hand it's nice to see the valley: 'let's solve this' attitude. On the other hand, it's common to see them blinded by hubris, resulting in problem solving approaches divorced from reality.

antris 8y ago
Weird to see comments like this. Elon Musk was asked to help, he agreed to come there and now people talk about "hubris" as if he had tried to force his help on them? Can't famous people even help kids stuck in a cave without someone criticizing them for it?
- akhatri_aus 8y ago
  It depends on what he wanted out of it. It was quite obvious nothing of the size of that submarine could fit in that narrow portion of the cave. That begs the question on whether it was more for publicity or it was actually intended to be used. Would it be realistic to see that submarine in Thailand or on some video camera in an LA pool?
  - antris 8y ago
    Are you an expert on cave diving and rescue or where does this analysis on what is obvious and what isn't comes from?
    - ofrzeta 8y ago
      It's obvious from the pictures of the submarine. When the press reports state that the cave is so narrow in places that you need to take off the scuba to get through, obviously the submarine that has a bigger diameter than a diver with a scuba won't pass.
      - antris 8y ago
        Again. This armchair analysis cannot decide whether a solution is fit for the job or not. You don't know everything that's happening at the site.
        ofrzeta 8y ago
        This is bollocks. "In narrow sections, rescuers will have to take off their air tanks and squeeze the boys and the tanks through". https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/_102441790_divers_through_tight_spaces_640-nc.png https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/...
        mehrdadn 8y ago
        > This is bollocks. "In narrow sections, rescuers will have to take off their air tanks and squeeze the boys and the tanks through". https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/.. https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/.... Do you see that diagram says "gap approx 40 cm"? Do you see that I already told you they deliberately designed their submarine to be 31 cm in diameter? Do you see that there's a chance that the oxygen tanks and their human chest combined are indeed more than 31 cm, and hence having to take them off might not say anything about whether a 31 cm tube will fit?
        ofrzeta 8y ago
        I can see that but I can also see that there's an air tank mounted on the outside of the submarine. This could probably be taken off while passing the narrow passage. On the other hand you would need to squeeze a person in that submarine over the whole diving range. That would probably not help feeling them more comfortable. Last not least in article you will find the quote "'The equipment he gave us is not practical for our mission,' Narongsak said Tuesday morning", that might prove my point. Finally I don't get why you are arguing that the submarine is such a great idea when it's clearly not.
        mehrdadn 8y ago
  - mehrdadn 8y ago
    > It was quite obvious nothing of the size of that submarine could fit in that narrow portion of the cave. What? How did you come to this conclusion? They deliberately designed it to be 31cm so that it would fit through the narrowest parts they knew of (38cm? 35cm?), and it was obvious to you that it wouldn't fit?
    - akhatri_aus 8y ago
      There's a diagram if you look around. Sure the narrowest portion is narrow, but you need to bend your body because this narrow portion is at a curve. A solid metal cylinder that can't bend had no chance at all to begin with. If a human cant go through without bending their body how can a cylinder containing a flat standing human get through? An engineer designing for this situation knows to optimise for the camera instead of the cave.
      - mehrdadn 8y ago
        You know, I actually had been wondering about the length myself for a while, but I hadn't seen any comments or quantifiable information on that one way or the other. I was wondering how much they had considered that even in a narrow hole they might need extra room of more than twice the length of the tube afterward to make sure it goes through, if the passage doesn't go straight. The bendability per se I admittedly didn't explicitly think about, though (though it kinda factors into the size). Every diagram I've seen so far has been grossly not-to-scale for something this small, and every objection I've seen thus far has been about the diameter, not the length or the shape. If you have any information on the shape (besides the diameter) it'd be awesome if you could link it here. (Unfortunately I have to go offline so I don't have the chance to Google further right now.) Thanks for the reply!
- learnstats2 8y ago
  >Can't famous people even help kids stuck in a cave without someone criticizing them for it? Yes, easily: 1. Don't press release (or tweet); treat what you are doing with confidentiality. 2. Actually help in a way that's helpful. Here's a good example http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/01/15/george-michael-secretly-donated-500000-to-hiv-aids-charity/ http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/01/15/george-michael-secretly...
  - codeulike 8y ago
    I kind of agree with (1) but (2) in this case is just 'built something to meet the requirements but everything had moved on by time of delivery' which I think is something all of us engineers here have experience of.
    - learnstats2 8y ago
      Elon Musk could have given money to the experts on the ground who were actually in the situation and knew what was needed. Instead, he wrongly assumed he knew better.
      - codeulike 8y ago
        Not that he knew better, just that he/spacex could contribute something that no-one else could. I don't think money was ever a problem in this situation.
      - antris 8y ago
        How do you know if Musk gave them money or not? How do you know if money was even the issue? How do you know Musk thought he knew better? Where is this coming from? Do you always assume you know everything that other people are doing/not doing or thinking/not thinking?
      - mehrdadn 8y ago
        From where do you get the impression that money can solve any problem?
      - 8y ago
- ofrzeta 8y ago
  He was asked to help? Where did you get that information?
  - mehrdadn 8y ago
    Just Google and click 2 links: https://twitter.com/MabzMagz/status/1014251869760249856 https://twitter.com/MabzMagz/status/1014251869760249856
    - ofrzeta 8y ago
      Are you serious? You mean some unknown person on Twitter asked him for help? Someone who has a link to an obscure Play store app in their profile. Oh well ...
      - mehrdadn 8y ago
        I'm pretty serious. You asked a question, I answered it. I'm sorry if you don't like the answer. I don't personally know the full set of people who have asked him for help, but the conversation following the tweet I linked is more than sufficient to prove to you that it was others asking him for help rather than Elon's hubris prompting him to dive into a situation he wasn't welcome at.
        ofrzeta 8y ago
        It's actually a bit saddening that you are serious. But on the other hand there are people who are doing global politics on Twitter. Usually when you are using the phrase "he has been asked for help" I would imply that he was asked by someone officially responsible for the rescue and not by random people on Twitter. Obviously that hasn't been the case.
        antris 8y ago
        > Usually when you are using the phrase "he has been asked for help" I would imply that he was asked by someone officially responsible for the rescue and not by random people on Twitter. Obviously that hasn't been the case. How do you know?
- jf- 8y ago
  A little common sense here. He’s trying to develop a de novo hardware solution in short time. If you wanted to help, you’d buy/rent top of the line drysuits with helmets, send those through with instructors and be done with it. You probably wouldn’t decide to start on hardware development.
  - antris 8y ago
    Where did you get the idea they were short on money or rescue equipment and/or Elon Musk hasn't rented or bought them rescue gear?
    - jf- 8y ago
      There’s no evidence for anything other than the submarine, and he really isn’t shy about announcing these things.
      - antris 8y ago
        The lack of evidence or tweets doesn't mean that Musk didn't help them in other ways.
        jf- 8y ago
        You’ll forgive me for not relying on faith.
        antris 8y ago
        I am not asking you to rely on faith, I'm simply asking you to drop your faith on "knowing" what goes on at the site and in Musk's mind and admit that you simply don't know.
  - laurent123456 8y ago
    I remember they said at some point that the children could not be rescued with diving equipment because it's dark, they are not experienced divers and they might panic under water. Maybe his solution to build a submarine instead comes from there?
- s2g 8y ago
  > Elon Musk was asked to help wasn't he asked to help by one of his twitter fans who eat up the "ELON IS LITERALLY TONY STARK" kool-aid?
lingz 8y ago
Follow up Guardian article: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jul/10/elon-musk-queries-expertise-of-thai-cave-rescue-officials https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jul/10/elon-musk-queri...

by lingz 8y ago

On one hand it's nice to see the valley: 'let's solve this' attitude. On the other hand, it's common to see them blinded by hubris, resulting in problem solving approaches divorced from reality.

antris 8y ago

Weird to see comments like this. Elon Musk was asked to help, he agreed to come there and now people talk about "hubris" as if he had tried to force his help on them? Can't famous people even help kids stuck in a cave without someone criticizing them for it?

akhatri_aus 8y ago
It depends on what he wanted out of it. It was quite obvious nothing of the size of that submarine could fit in that narrow portion of the cave. That begs the question on whether it was more for publicity or it was actually intended to be used. Would it be realistic to see that submarine in Thailand or on some video camera in an LA pool?
- antris 8y ago
  Are you an expert on cave diving and rescue or where does this analysis on what is obvious and what isn't comes from?
  - ofrzeta 8y ago
    It's obvious from the pictures of the submarine. When the press reports state that the cave is so narrow in places that you need to take off the scuba to get through, obviously the submarine that has a bigger diameter than a diver with a scuba won't pass.
    - antris 8y ago
      Again. This armchair analysis cannot decide whether a solution is fit for the job or not. You don't know everything that's happening at the site.
      - ofrzeta 8y ago
        This is bollocks. "In narrow sections, rescuers will have to take off their air tanks and squeeze the boys and the tanks through". https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/_102441790_divers_through_tight_spaces_640-nc.png https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/...
        mehrdadn 8y ago
        > This is bollocks. "In narrow sections, rescuers will have to take off their air tanks and squeeze the boys and the tanks through". https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/.. https://ichef.bbci.co.uk/news/660/cpsprodpb/25F2/production/.... Do you see that diagram says "gap approx 40 cm"? Do you see that I already told you they deliberately designed their submarine to be 31 cm in diameter? Do you see that there's a chance that the oxygen tanks and their human chest combined are indeed more than 31 cm, and hence having to take them off might not say anything about whether a 31 cm tube will fit?
        ofrzeta 8y ago
        I can see that but I can also see that there's an air tank mounted on the outside of the submarine. This could probably be taken off while passing the narrow passage. On the other hand you would need to squeeze a person in that submarine over the whole diving range. That would probably not help feeling them more comfortable. Last not least in article you will find the quote "'The equipment he gave us is not practical for our mission,' Narongsak said Tuesday morning", that might prove my point. Finally I don't get why you are arguing that the submarine is such a great idea when it's clearly not.
        mehrdadn 8y ago
- mehrdadn 8y ago
  > It was quite obvious nothing of the size of that submarine could fit in that narrow portion of the cave. What? How did you come to this conclusion? They deliberately designed it to be 31cm so that it would fit through the narrowest parts they knew of (38cm? 35cm?), and it was obvious to you that it wouldn't fit?
  - akhatri_aus 8y ago
    There's a diagram if you look around. Sure the narrowest portion is narrow, but you need to bend your body because this narrow portion is at a curve. A solid metal cylinder that can't bend had no chance at all to begin with. If a human cant go through without bending their body how can a cylinder containing a flat standing human get through? An engineer designing for this situation knows to optimise for the camera instead of the cave.
    - mehrdadn 8y ago
      You know, I actually had been wondering about the length myself for a while, but I hadn't seen any comments or quantifiable information on that one way or the other. I was wondering how much they had considered that even in a narrow hole they might need extra room of more than twice the length of the tube afterward to make sure it goes through, if the passage doesn't go straight. The bendability per se I admittedly didn't explicitly think about, though (though it kinda factors into the size). Every diagram I've seen so far has been grossly not-to-scale for something this small, and every objection I've seen thus far has been about the diameter, not the length or the shape. If you have any information on the shape (besides the diameter) it'd be awesome if you could link it here. (Unfortunately I have to go offline so I don't have the chance to Google further right now.) Thanks for the reply!
learnstats2 8y ago
>Can't famous people even help kids stuck in a cave without someone criticizing them for it? Yes, easily: 1. Don't press release (or tweet); treat what you are doing with confidentiality. 2. Actually help in a way that's helpful. Here's a good example http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/01/15/george-michael-secretly-donated-500000-to-hiv-aids-charity/ http://www.pinknews.co.uk/2018/01/15/george-michael-secretly...
- codeulike 8y ago
  I kind of agree with (1) but (2) in this case is just 'built something to meet the requirements but everything had moved on by time of delivery' which I think is something all of us engineers here have experience of.
  - learnstats2 8y ago
    Elon Musk could have given money to the experts on the ground who were actually in the situation and knew what was needed. Instead, he wrongly assumed he knew better.
    - codeulike 8y ago
      Not that he knew better, just that he/spacex could contribute something that no-one else could. I don't think money was ever a problem in this situation.
    - antris 8y ago
      How do you know if Musk gave them money or not? How do you know if money was even the issue? How do you know Musk thought he knew better? Where is this coming from? Do you always assume you know everything that other people are doing/not doing or thinking/not thinking?
    - mehrdadn 8y ago
      From where do you get the impression that money can solve any problem?
    - 8y ago
ofrzeta 8y ago
He was asked to help? Where did you get that information?
- mehrdadn 8y ago
  Just Google and click 2 links: https://twitter.com/MabzMagz/status/1014251869760249856 https://twitter.com/MabzMagz/status/1014251869760249856
  - ofrzeta 8y ago
    Are you serious? You mean some unknown person on Twitter asked him for help? Someone who has a link to an obscure Play store app in their profile. Oh well ...
    - mehrdadn 8y ago
      I'm pretty serious. You asked a question, I answered it. I'm sorry if you don't like the answer. I don't personally know the full set of people who have asked him for help, but the conversation following the tweet I linked is more than sufficient to prove to you that it was others asking him for help rather than Elon's hubris prompting him to dive into a situation he wasn't welcome at.
      - ofrzeta 8y ago
        It's actually a bit saddening that you are serious. But on the other hand there are people who are doing global politics on Twitter. Usually when you are using the phrase "he has been asked for help" I would imply that he was asked by someone officially responsible for the rescue and not by random people on Twitter. Obviously that hasn't been the case.
        antris 8y ago
        > Usually when you are using the phrase "he has been asked for help" I would imply that he was asked by someone officially responsible for the rescue and not by random people on Twitter. Obviously that hasn't been the case. How do you know?
jf- 8y ago
A little common sense here. He’s trying to develop a de novo hardware solution in short time. If you wanted to help, you’d buy/rent top of the line drysuits with helmets, send those through with instructors and be done with it. You probably wouldn’t decide to start on hardware development.
- antris 8y ago
  Where did you get the idea they were short on money or rescue equipment and/or Elon Musk hasn't rented or bought them rescue gear?
  - jf- 8y ago
    There’s no evidence for anything other than the submarine, and he really isn’t shy about announcing these things.
    - antris 8y ago
      The lack of evidence or tweets doesn't mean that Musk didn't help them in other ways.
      - jf- 8y ago
        You’ll forgive me for not relying on faith.
        antris 8y ago
        I am not asking you to rely on faith, I'm simply asking you to drop your faith on "knowing" what goes on at the site and in Musk's mind and admit that you simply don't know.
- laurent123456 8y ago
  I remember they said at some point that the children could not be rescued with diving equipment because it's dark, they are not experienced divers and they might panic under water. Maybe his solution to build a submarine instead comes from there?
s2g 8y ago
> Elon Musk was asked to help wasn't he asked to help by one of his twitter fans who eat up the "ELON IS LITERALLY TONY STARK" kool-aid?

lingz 8y ago

Follow up Guardian article: https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jul/10/elon-musk-queries-expertise-of-thai-cave-rescue-officials https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/jul/10/elon-musk-queri...