8 ms·

We haven’t solved homelessness, poverty, cancer, or war. We don’t have self-piloted flying cars. But for about $90 in parts, one person can design, manufacture,

by js2 8y ago

We haven’t solved homelessness, poverty, cancer, or war. We don’t have self-piloted flying cars. But for about $90 in parts, one person can design, manufacture, and build their own bespoke smart watch. Humans have made truly remarkable progress in some very specific ways.

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
josefresco 8y ago
>But for about $90 in parts Oh and I don't know, about $250K worth of professional experience and skills but yeah.. we have.
- mhb 8y ago
  And a dollar for the piece of chalk.
  - castlecrasher2 8y ago
    don't forget imgur's hosting costs...and the computer you're on right now!
- glitcher 8y ago
  And if you had zero of the tools and equipment beforehand used in the process, what would the additional cost be to just get started?
  - kickopotomus 8y ago
    If you want to buy your own 3D printer and reflow, it's going to be pricey. If you live in an urban area, there are likely "maker spaces" nearby where you can pay a nominal fee to use the communal tools.
  - LolWolf 8y ago
    What tools? I think the biggest thing is a reflow oven, but, honestly, I've soldered using a cheap, used toaster oven from Goodwill + an oven thermometer. Worked wonders! The 3D printer might have been the biggest offender, to be fair, but many libraries have some (as do many maker spaces that are hourly). Additionally, you can order a number of 3D printed parts online as well, for relatively low cost.
    - bewuethr 8y ago
      I'm pretty sure they used a Monoprice Mini Delta[1], which is one of the cheapest fully assembled 3D printers available (about $160), so it's not even that bad without a printer. [1]: https://www.mpminidelta.com https://www.mpminidelta.com
  - opencl 8y ago
    The case is 3D printed on what appears to be a $160 Monoprice Mini Delta. Soldering was done in a reflow oven, commercial units start at around $200 or you can use a modified toaster oven. This board doesn't look too terrible to do with an iron or hot air gun either. You can get a decent combo hot air/iron station for about $60. You'll want some test equipment, cheap multimeters start at free from harbor freight but you'll probably at least want to step up to a ~$15 model. Logic analyzers are handy and until fairly recently were quite expensive but now you can get them for $10. An oscilloscope might be handy for debugging the power circuitry here, you can get a cheap one for $20 or a nice one for a few hundred or an old nice one for about a hundred. An adjustable bench power supply isn't really necessary but nice to have, those start around $50. A professional EE's workbench will probably have many thousands of dollars worth of equipment on it but most hobbyists have much more modest budgets.
    - stephen_g 8y ago
      The aQFN package of the particular microcontroller they use would be impossible to do with a soldering iron. You could do it with hot air though.
  - avhon1 8y ago
    Around $400-$600. More if you need to do in-depth troubleshooting. The 3D printer OP uses is a Monoprice; it looks like the delta mini (https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=21666 https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=21666). It costs $160. The circuit boards and the solder paste mask are made by another company and delivered by mail. It's been a while since I looked up costs, but it's quite cheap these days, and the watch's circuit board is small, so I can comfortably say it cost under $100 to get the mask and a few copies of the board. The soldering could be done with a $200 chinese reflow oven, like the T962 (https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=t962 https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=t962), or with a $20 toaster oven, an oven thermometer, and some careful timing. (Some people do their surface-mount soldering with just a frying pan and their kitchen stove!) The rest is just basic hand tools -- screwdriver, file, sandpaper, tweezers, maybe a magnifier. Maybe a $5 Arduino clone to help with debugging and programming, and a $35 T12 soldering tip+controller for doing soldering test stuff and "I messed up" wires. If the first try doesn't work, and it's not obvious why, you'll to spend more money. If fixing the problem requires changing the board board then you need to order new ones, and the mask to solder them. DC voltage levels, current consumption, and electrical continuity can be checked with a $20 multimeter. The presence, frequency, and integrity of signals can be checked with a good used analog oscilloscope costing $100-$200. Some things are easier to check with a new, basic digital oscilloscope costing $300-$400. If the electronics are good but there's something wrong with the software, you'll need something to read the signals the chips are exchanging with each other. Basic, low-speed (less than 1 MHz or so) signals can be read and generated with the Arduino board, or a $30 Bus Pirate. If your project uses higher-speed signals, you'll need a logic analyzer. A good USB model is the Saleae Logic 8, which costs $400. (There is overlap in the capabilities of digital multimeters and logic analyzers, so you can sometimes just buy one and use it for both purposes.)
- davidzweig 8y ago
  You can literally learn all the required skills for $0 (Youtube, online lectures, personal projects).. and a few years of your life.
- dotancohen 8y ago
  My ten year old daughter recently built a robot that finds a face and then applies blush. We used an old printer for parts, a blush brush, and an Arduino clone. That's $3 in parts. She also had no prior experience with the Arduino or C, though she knows a bit of Python. That is the level of technology that we are at today. We are living in the future. And it is a future that Asimov would like.
njepa 8y ago
While I can appreciate the sentiment, the reason we can do things like this is because of all the research and development that went into things like integrated circuits, manufacturing and CAD. This is more the classic hacker thing, were you use something larger and serious for you own purposes. Not making something primarily for serving ads, or whatnot. This technology can very well, and was to a large extent made to, be used for something else. I don't think researchers or EEs are stepping over homeless people more than anyone else. When it comes to doing good things with electronics I would be more worried about patents, or just finding the time.
- js2 8y ago
  > all the research and development that went into things like integrated circuits, manufacturing and CAD It's more than just that though. Centuries of incremental knowledge passing from one generation to the next. A global economy that allows chips manufactured in China to be shipped to American for peanuts. All the collaborative effort that went into writing an OS that's available for anyone to use free of charge. That someone is able to be so specialized, they can do this in their leisure time. It is an incredible amount of human cooperation and achievement over thousands of years. I suppose you could say that about many things today, but for whatever reason, this watch put me in a bit of a philosophical mood. I guess: humans collaborating achieve great things; we should do more of that. (You know what else reliably gets me marveling about humanity? Attending a symphony orchestra performance.)
jonatron 8y ago
Homeless, poverty, cancer, or war are all people problems, and people are complicated. We do have flying cars but they're not very good at flying or driving.
- freehunter 8y ago
  The “we don’t have flying cars” argument always strikes me as begging for something to complain about. We could easily have flying cars if there was literally one reason to have a flying car. There is not a single reason to have a flying car, so no one has put in the time to make one because no one would buy it because it’s pointless.
  - gpm 8y ago
    Flying cars would be a great solution to congestion. Assuming perfect reliability, reasonably low sound levels, super high efficiency engines, and flying pigs.
    - dotancohen 8y ago
      Flying cars would move the congestion from the surface roads to the skies. Over your house, over your children's heads. And those 1000 KG bullets would be, on average, piloted by someone with the skill of the average driver today. No thank you.
  - js2 8y ago
    I don't actually want flying cars. It's a metaphor for "how we imagine some problem of today will be solved in the future."
  - aasasd 8y ago
    Have you seen the 90s? Cool things don't need a reason.
  - tty2300 8y ago
    Just put wheels on a helicopter and now you have a flying car.
Reedx 8y ago
Although unfortunately not solved, we've made great strides in regards to child mortality, extreme poverty, war, violence, health, freedom, literacy... If you could choose any point in human history to be born, you'd be best off choosing today. https://www.gatesnotes.com/Development/Max-Roser-three-facts-everyone-should-know https://www.gatesnotes.com/Development/Max-Roser-three-facts... https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-conditions-in-5-charts https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-condit...
- axiom92 8y ago
  A book that echoes the sentiment: https://www.amazon.com/Enlightenment-Now-Science-Humanism-Progress/dp/0525427570 https://www.amazon.com/Enlightenment-Now-Science-Humanism-Pr... It's an amazing read as well, much like Pinker's other works.
- lsiebert 8y ago
  I think William Gibson say something like, "The future is here it's just unevenly distributed." We have made great strides, but in the U.S. social mobility is lower now, life expectancy is down, so if you have to be born to a poor family, being born earlier might be better.
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - kijin 8y ago
    If you had the power to choose when to be born, you might also have the power to choose where to be born. In which case you might want to choose someplace other than the U.S.
    - atemerev 8y ago
      There are few better places for social mobility than the US. If you are poor, but smart and ambitious, being in the US is the best thing that could happen to you.
steve918 8y ago
We've possessed the technology and resources to solve the first two for at least a decade, but it's unclear how doing so would increase share-holder value.
nkrisc 8y ago
And when we're piloting spacecraft between various colonies in our solar system, we'll still have wars and poverty and suffering, but one person will be able to design, manufacture, and build their own bespoke nuclear reactor for their personal spacecraft.
mensetmanusman 8y ago
Homelessness: unsolvable in a society where it is illegal to force someone to take care of themselves (by being sheltered). The west has decided that individual freedom is worth the cost of some people using it to choose to be homeless. I think this legal framework will make it impossible to solve homelessness. Poverty: It is now known that there is a rising gulf between subjective and objective well being. A majority of millionaires do not think they are rich. I think this psychology will make it impossible to solve poverty. Cancer: Entropy/cosmic rays scrambling DNA... I think thermodynamics will make it impossible to solve cancer (as in, all cancer) for everyone (very rich with DNA repair therapy in the medium/near future). War: Actually living now in the most peaceful time in human history as a % of humans in conflict. I think the human desire for power/wealth (again, back to poverty) will make it impossible to solve the zero war scenario. At least nukes scared everyone from the big wars so far :)
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- c22 8y ago
  > Homelessness: unsolvable in a society where it is illegal to force someone to take care of themselves (by being sheltered). The west has decided that individual freedom is worth the cost of some people using it to choose to be homeless. I think this legal framework will make it impossible to solve homelessness. This may be philosophically true, and probably even technically true in practice, but I suspect the vast majority of homeless would prefer better shelter than they currently enjoy. For whatever reason, these people have failed to attain better shelter within our societal system. Some people blame the system for letting these people down, other people blame the individual for not having what it takes to "make it", but I don't think you can call this a choice unless you call failure a choice. Given that, there probably are things we can do to "solve" the vast majority of homelessness, so don't give up just yet. The few people that then legitimately choose to be homeless will probably be so scant as to be barely noticed by the rest of us.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- deleted 8y ago

by js2 8y ago

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

josefresco 8y ago

>But for about $90 in parts Oh and I don't know, about $250K worth of professional experience and skills but yeah.. we have.

mhb 8y ago
And a dollar for the piece of chalk.
- castlecrasher2 8y ago
  don't forget imgur's hosting costs...and the computer you're on right now!
glitcher 8y ago
And if you had zero of the tools and equipment beforehand used in the process, what would the additional cost be to just get started?
- kickopotomus 8y ago
  If you want to buy your own 3D printer and reflow, it's going to be pricey. If you live in an urban area, there are likely "maker spaces" nearby where you can pay a nominal fee to use the communal tools.
- LolWolf 8y ago
  What tools? I think the biggest thing is a reflow oven, but, honestly, I've soldered using a cheap, used toaster oven from Goodwill + an oven thermometer. Worked wonders! The 3D printer might have been the biggest offender, to be fair, but many libraries have some (as do many maker spaces that are hourly). Additionally, you can order a number of 3D printed parts online as well, for relatively low cost.
  - bewuethr 8y ago
    I'm pretty sure they used a Monoprice Mini Delta[1], which is one of the cheapest fully assembled 3D printers available (about $160), so it's not even that bad without a printer. [1]: https://www.mpminidelta.com https://www.mpminidelta.com
- opencl 8y ago
  The case is 3D printed on what appears to be a $160 Monoprice Mini Delta. Soldering was done in a reflow oven, commercial units start at around $200 or you can use a modified toaster oven. This board doesn't look too terrible to do with an iron or hot air gun either. You can get a decent combo hot air/iron station for about $60. You'll want some test equipment, cheap multimeters start at free from harbor freight but you'll probably at least want to step up to a ~$15 model. Logic analyzers are handy and until fairly recently were quite expensive but now you can get them for $10. An oscilloscope might be handy for debugging the power circuitry here, you can get a cheap one for $20 or a nice one for a few hundred or an old nice one for about a hundred. An adjustable bench power supply isn't really necessary but nice to have, those start around $50. A professional EE's workbench will probably have many thousands of dollars worth of equipment on it but most hobbyists have much more modest budgets.
  - stephen_g 8y ago
    The aQFN package of the particular microcontroller they use would be impossible to do with a soldering iron. You could do it with hot air though.
- avhon1 8y ago
  Around $400-$600. More if you need to do in-depth troubleshooting. The 3D printer OP uses is a Monoprice; it looks like the delta mini (https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=21666 https://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=21666). It costs $160. The circuit boards and the solder paste mask are made by another company and delivered by mail. It's been a while since I looked up costs, but it's quite cheap these days, and the watch's circuit board is small, so I can comfortably say it cost under $100 to get the mask and a few copies of the board. The soldering could be done with a $200 chinese reflow oven, like the T962 (https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=t962 https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_nkw=t962), or with a $20 toaster oven, an oven thermometer, and some careful timing. (Some people do their surface-mount soldering with just a frying pan and their kitchen stove!) The rest is just basic hand tools -- screwdriver, file, sandpaper, tweezers, maybe a magnifier. Maybe a $5 Arduino clone to help with debugging and programming, and a $35 T12 soldering tip+controller for doing soldering test stuff and "I messed up" wires. If the first try doesn't work, and it's not obvious why, you'll to spend more money. If fixing the problem requires changing the board board then you need to order new ones, and the mask to solder them. DC voltage levels, current consumption, and electrical continuity can be checked with a $20 multimeter. The presence, frequency, and integrity of signals can be checked with a good used analog oscilloscope costing $100-$200. Some things are easier to check with a new, basic digital oscilloscope costing $300-$400. If the electronics are good but there's something wrong with the software, you'll need something to read the signals the chips are exchanging with each other. Basic, low-speed (less than 1 MHz or so) signals can be read and generated with the Arduino board, or a $30 Bus Pirate. If your project uses higher-speed signals, you'll need a logic analyzer. A good USB model is the Saleae Logic 8, which costs $400. (There is overlap in the capabilities of digital multimeters and logic analyzers, so you can sometimes just buy one and use it for both purposes.)
davidzweig 8y ago
You can literally learn all the required skills for $0 (Youtube, online lectures, personal projects).. and a few years of your life.
dotancohen 8y ago
My ten year old daughter recently built a robot that finds a face and then applies blush. We used an old printer for parts, a blush brush, and an Arduino clone. That's $3 in parts. She also had no prior experience with the Arduino or C, though she knows a bit of Python. That is the level of technology that we are at today. We are living in the future. And it is a future that Asimov would like.

njepa 8y ago

While I can appreciate the sentiment, the reason we can do things like this is because of all the research and development that went into things like integrated circuits, manufacturing and CAD. This is more the classic hacker thing, were you use something larger and serious for you own purposes. Not making something primarily for serving ads, or whatnot. This technology can very well, and was to a large extent made to, be used for something else. I don't think researchers or EEs are stepping over homeless people more than anyone else. When it comes to doing good things with electronics I would be more worried about patents, or just finding the time.

js2 8y ago
> all the research and development that went into things like integrated circuits, manufacturing and CAD It's more than just that though. Centuries of incremental knowledge passing from one generation to the next. A global economy that allows chips manufactured in China to be shipped to American for peanuts. All the collaborative effort that went into writing an OS that's available for anyone to use free of charge. That someone is able to be so specialized, they can do this in their leisure time. It is an incredible amount of human cooperation and achievement over thousands of years. I suppose you could say that about many things today, but for whatever reason, this watch put me in a bit of a philosophical mood. I guess: humans collaborating achieve great things; we should do more of that. (You know what else reliably gets me marveling about humanity? Attending a symphony orchestra performance.)

jonatron 8y ago

Homeless, poverty, cancer, or war are all people problems, and people are complicated. We do have flying cars but they're not very good at flying or driving.

freehunter 8y ago
The “we don’t have flying cars” argument always strikes me as begging for something to complain about. We could easily have flying cars if there was literally one reason to have a flying car. There is not a single reason to have a flying car, so no one has put in the time to make one because no one would buy it because it’s pointless.
- gpm 8y ago
  Flying cars would be a great solution to congestion. Assuming perfect reliability, reasonably low sound levels, super high efficiency engines, and flying pigs.
  - dotancohen 8y ago
    Flying cars would move the congestion from the surface roads to the skies. Over your house, over your children's heads. And those 1000 KG bullets would be, on average, piloted by someone with the skill of the average driver today. No thank you.
- js2 8y ago
  I don't actually want flying cars. It's a metaphor for "how we imagine some problem of today will be solved in the future."
- aasasd 8y ago
  Have you seen the 90s? Cool things don't need a reason.
- tty2300 8y ago
  Just put wheels on a helicopter and now you have a flying car.

Reedx 8y ago

Although unfortunately not solved, we've made great strides in regards to child mortality, extreme poverty, war, violence, health, freedom, literacy... If you could choose any point in human history to be born, you'd be best off choosing today. https://www.gatesnotes.com/Development/Max-Roser-three-facts-everyone-should-know https://www.gatesnotes.com/Development/Max-Roser-three-facts... https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-conditions-in-5-charts https://ourworldindata.org/a-history-of-global-living-condit...

axiom92 8y ago
A book that echoes the sentiment: https://www.amazon.com/Enlightenment-Now-Science-Humanism-Progress/dp/0525427570 https://www.amazon.com/Enlightenment-Now-Science-Humanism-Pr... It's an amazing read as well, much like Pinker's other works.
lsiebert 8y ago
I think William Gibson say something like, "The future is here it's just unevenly distributed." We have made great strides, but in the U.S. social mobility is lower now, life expectancy is down, so if you have to be born to a poor family, being born earlier might be better.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- kijin 8y ago
  If you had the power to choose when to be born, you might also have the power to choose where to be born. In which case you might want to choose someplace other than the U.S.
  - atemerev 8y ago
    There are few better places for social mobility than the US. If you are poor, but smart and ambitious, being in the US is the best thing that could happen to you.

steve918 8y ago

We've possessed the technology and resources to solve the first two for at least a decade, but it's unclear how doing so would increase share-holder value.

nkrisc 8y ago

And when we're piloting spacecraft between various colonies in our solar system, we'll still have wars and poverty and suffering, but one person will be able to design, manufacture, and build their own bespoke nuclear reactor for their personal spacecraft.

mensetmanusman 8y ago

Homelessness: unsolvable in a society where it is illegal to force someone to take care of themselves (by being sheltered). The west has decided that individual freedom is worth the cost of some people using it to choose to be homeless. I think this legal framework will make it impossible to solve homelessness. Poverty: It is now known that there is a rising gulf between subjective and objective well being. A majority of millionaires do not think they are rich. I think this psychology will make it impossible to solve poverty. Cancer: Entropy/cosmic rays scrambling DNA... I think thermodynamics will make it impossible to solve cancer (as in, all cancer) for everyone (very rich with DNA repair therapy in the medium/near future). War: Actually living now in the most peaceful time in human history as a % of humans in conflict. I think the human desire for power/wealth (again, back to poverty) will make it impossible to solve the zero war scenario. At least nukes scared everyone from the big wars so far :)

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
c22 8y ago
> Homelessness: unsolvable in a society where it is illegal to force someone to take care of themselves (by being sheltered). The west has decided that individual freedom is worth the cost of some people using it to choose to be homeless. I think this legal framework will make it impossible to solve homelessness. This may be philosophically true, and probably even technically true in practice, but I suspect the vast majority of homeless would prefer better shelter than they currently enjoy. For whatever reason, these people have failed to attain better shelter within our societal system. Some people blame the system for letting these people down, other people blame the individual for not having what it takes to "make it", but I don't think you can call this a choice unless you call failure a choice. Given that, there probably are things we can do to "solve" the vast majority of homelessness, so don't give up just yet. The few people that then legitimately choose to be homeless will probably be so scant as to be barely noticed by the rest of us.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
deleted 8y ago