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In some ways this is what has happened with the transfer of manufacturing to China. Building things requires building components, and their components, and thei
by jl6 7y ago
In some ways this is what has happened with the transfer of manufacturing to China. Building things requires building components, and their components, and their components, and so on down. That whole stack is withering in western democracies, so it’s incredibly difficult to “bring back” something like iPhone manufacturing without retaining a deep dependency on China anyway.
- dotancohen 7y agoThis is the answer to the question "Why not build more Saturn Vs". We no longer have the tools to build the tools to build the machines to build the parts of the Saturn V.
- StavrosK 7y agoWhy not?
- TeMPOraL 7y agoBecause "unused muscle atrophy" applies very much to our technology as well. A lot of knowledge surrounding technological processes isn't really captured beyond institutional culture and individual memory. So if there isn't demand for some specific technology, the capacity and knowledge to build it will wither and die with the organizations and people who built it. We can't do a Saturn V today. We might be able to do a Saturn V equivalent, though, as both NASA and SpaceX are retracing the steps towards heavy lifters.
- StavrosK 7y agoYou should write all this up on a single place, it's very interesting.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoI just might put it up on my blog. Need to collect references for the things I've been saying first. I first need to finish and ask someone to proofread my long overdue post on my views about advertising industry.
- StavrosK 7y agoI can proofread if you want.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoThanks. I'll send you a draft later tonight.
- monktastic1 7y agohttp://jacek.zlydach.pl http://jacek.zlydach.pl, yes? I eagerly await this piece. I can think of a lot of people (and groups) who would find it enlightening!
- TeMPOraL 7y agoYes. I see you have an e-mail address in your profile; I'll drop you an e-mail when I'm done with it.
- monktastic1 7y agoThanks. Already subscribed to your feed :)
- cmendel 7y agoHey person, I hope it wouldn't be to presumptuous for me to also ask for an email about this? I'd be very interested in what all you have to say.
- TeMPOraL 7y agoNot at all! But since you don't have your e-mail published in your profile, you need to mail me so I know where to send the notification :).
- angus-prune 7y agoI remember reading that some of the textile techonology that enabled the arctic/anarctic expeditions in the early 20th century has already been lost. They're having to analyse the garments in medical scanners to work out how the fabrics work. The idea that technology that enabled the equivalent of the space race could be lost within a century is quite sobering.
- ateng 7y agoThis. And if one still struggles to understand the importance of institutional culture + individual memory, I would like into invite you to the following thought experiment. “Imagine waking up the next morning and the world totally forgot all knowledge on Linux Kernel, and you are now tasked to release the next major version with major changes / improvements” And remember the documentation and tests we have on Saturn V is certainly not as great as what we have on Linux kernel.