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This got me thinking. Once I thought it was fun, but the more I look at it, the more I feel it is utterly pointless. A racing car has a function: to get around

This got me thinking. Once I thought it was fun, but the more I look at it, the more I feel it is utterly pointless. A racing car has a function: to get around a track faster than other cars (over a period of laps). To do this, it needs to be versatile: turning, braking, acceleration, fuel consumption, range of vision and suspension (among others) play a role. That's the true engineering challenge. It's why it has wheels, not wings. But to simply go fast, seems a bit pointless to me.

krapp 7y ago
The pointlessness is kind of the point, along with a bit of juvenile thrill. These cars are a display of wealth and excess. You're telling the world you can afford this much power and don't need to worry about things like utility or efficiency, and maybe you'll just keep it in a garage or drive it around a track, but still you can have a car so powerful it's almost illegal and most people can't.
- edejong 7y ago
  idk... I've always assumed that the pointlessness is in the playfulness: extending our boundaries, setting new rules. We value the daring, the boundless, the discoverers and the challengers. And I understand we connect a certain status to that and I also understand that certain people just want to be able to buy the status without putting in the time, knowledge and risk. But for me at least, this is so remote from and unconnected to the original challenge and thrill, that it becomes idiotic: pointless without even the playfulness.
  - krapp 7y ago
    Some people buy million dollar watches because they appreciate the craftsmanship and quality, some people buy them so you'll know just how much more valuable their time is than yours. It's a status display in either case, given that one could adequately tell the time on a cheap digital Casio.
    - edejong 7y ago
      Yes, but there is an interesting difference between the two w.r.t. status. Status is generally derived from the signaling of certain values. Wealth is one such value, but in general we assign status to a combination of values. Aesthetic + Wealth = Art. Strength + endurance = Athletics. Leadership + Vision + Knowledge + Intelligence = Innovation. For me, at least, these super expensive cars have lost all signaling value, except 'wealth'. Because of that, I would almost call it tasteless, senseless and idiotic.
manigandham 7y ago
I think you're underestimating just how much engineering it actually takes to get a road-legal car to go this speed. Going fast in this case is just a different set of parameters to solve for, but no less of a challenge.
zone411 7y ago
A car built for top speed is not the best choice on a race track but you don't need a purpose-built race car to have an occasional fun track day. Occasional because it's not cost-efficient to bring an unmodified sports car to a race track too often (brakes and tires will go quickly), as opposed to a dedicated track car, and at some point, even the fastest sports car will seem slow in turns and under braking. A car built for top speed should be exhilarating on a drag strip, though I doubt more than a few owners will go.
afarrell 7y ago
Fun is important because directing and motivating teams of humans is a difficult skill -- especially when you want to do things where the path forward is at all nebulous, like materials and design research.
- edejong 7y ago
  Yes. Fun emerges due to sharing of similar goals. People have fun because they play the same game, enjoy the same movie or simply have the same freedoms. I agree that it helps direct and motivate us. (Thanks for that insight!) I guess I just cannot share in the purpose of the team making this car go +300 mph. We already have the Thrust SSC (1228 km/h / 763 mph). So what does this prove? That if you want to take corners and need to see what happens behind you, you won't get to go that fast? Why not productionize the Thrust SSC then? Max speed (to me) is just a senseless metric. It's a bit like clock speed of a CPU. Interesting metric, but only in relationship to other factors.
hvidgaard 7y ago
By that logic a top fuel dragster is pointless? For some racing is something that happens in a straight line, for others it involve turns - neither serves a purpose in the grand scheme of things and can be considered "pointless".
- edejong 7y ago
  No, because a dragster has a specific function. It is a perfect counter-example to the senseless: 'look how fast our super-car can go.' There are many more values involved in dragster racing: knowledge, innovation, joy, creativity, competition, determinism, meaning, enthusiasm and playfulness. And it is all related to a singular goal: getting over the finish line faster than the competition. But with such a super car, idk, I'm just left with an empty feeling: why? What is the point?
  - hvidgaard 7y ago
    But all of them have various constraints, a formula so to speak, that they must adhere to. A specific function within that world of constraints. The Bugatti is a street legal car designed to shatter speed records in a straight line. If that isn't specific function with a formula I don't know what qualifies. The street legal part of a super car is not inherently different than the 1.6L FI hybrid engine regulations of Formula 1, it's just a different set of constraints. You do not create a winning street legal super car without knowledge, innovation, creativity, determinism, enthusiasm - and by proxy of those joy, competition, and playfulness. I simply do not understand the gate keeping here. If it's not your thing, fair enough. But please do not invalidate the joy of others because it is real to them. It's comparable to an mechanical watch. You can make a digital watch significantly better at time keeping and all the other functions, that is substantially cheaper both to produce and maintain. But if mechanical precision devices make your world go around, then I can appreciate that - I'm just not going to pay $10k yearly to maintain an elaborate mechanical wristwatch.

krapp 7y ago

The pointlessness is kind of the point, along with a bit of juvenile thrill. These cars are a display of wealth and excess. You're telling the world you can afford this much power and don't need to worry about things like utility or efficiency, and maybe you'll just keep it in a garage or drive it around a track, but still you can have a car so powerful it's almost illegal and most people can't.

edejong 7y ago
idk... I've always assumed that the pointlessness is in the playfulness: extending our boundaries, setting new rules. We value the daring, the boundless, the discoverers and the challengers. And I understand we connect a certain status to that and I also understand that certain people just want to be able to buy the status without putting in the time, knowledge and risk. But for me at least, this is so remote from and unconnected to the original challenge and thrill, that it becomes idiotic: pointless without even the playfulness.
- krapp 7y ago
  Some people buy million dollar watches because they appreciate the craftsmanship and quality, some people buy them so you'll know just how much more valuable their time is than yours. It's a status display in either case, given that one could adequately tell the time on a cheap digital Casio.
  - edejong 7y ago
    Yes, but there is an interesting difference between the two w.r.t. status. Status is generally derived from the signaling of certain values. Wealth is one such value, but in general we assign status to a combination of values. Aesthetic + Wealth = Art. Strength + endurance = Athletics. Leadership + Vision + Knowledge + Intelligence = Innovation. For me, at least, these super expensive cars have lost all signaling value, except 'wealth'. Because of that, I would almost call it tasteless, senseless and idiotic.

manigandham 7y ago

I think you're underestimating just how much engineering it actually takes to get a road-legal car to go this speed. Going fast in this case is just a different set of parameters to solve for, but no less of a challenge.

zone411 7y ago

A car built for top speed is not the best choice on a race track but you don't need a purpose-built race car to have an occasional fun track day. Occasional because it's not cost-efficient to bring an unmodified sports car to a race track too often (brakes and tires will go quickly), as opposed to a dedicated track car, and at some point, even the fastest sports car will seem slow in turns and under braking. A car built for top speed should be exhilarating on a drag strip, though I doubt more than a few owners will go.

afarrell 7y ago

Fun is important because directing and motivating teams of humans is a difficult skill -- especially when you want to do things where the path forward is at all nebulous, like materials and design research.

edejong 7y ago
Yes. Fun emerges due to sharing of similar goals. People have fun because they play the same game, enjoy the same movie or simply have the same freedoms. I agree that it helps direct and motivate us. (Thanks for that insight!) I guess I just cannot share in the purpose of the team making this car go +300 mph. We already have the Thrust SSC (1228 km/h / 763 mph). So what does this prove? That if you want to take corners and need to see what happens behind you, you won't get to go that fast? Why not productionize the Thrust SSC then? Max speed (to me) is just a senseless metric. It's a bit like clock speed of a CPU. Interesting metric, but only in relationship to other factors.

hvidgaard 7y ago

By that logic a top fuel dragster is pointless? For some racing is something that happens in a straight line, for others it involve turns - neither serves a purpose in the grand scheme of things and can be considered "pointless".

edejong 7y ago
No, because a dragster has a specific function. It is a perfect counter-example to the senseless: 'look how fast our super-car can go.' There are many more values involved in dragster racing: knowledge, innovation, joy, creativity, competition, determinism, meaning, enthusiasm and playfulness. And it is all related to a singular goal: getting over the finish line faster than the competition. But with such a super car, idk, I'm just left with an empty feeling: why? What is the point?
- hvidgaard 7y ago
  But all of them have various constraints, a formula so to speak, that they must adhere to. A specific function within that world of constraints. The Bugatti is a street legal car designed to shatter speed records in a straight line. If that isn't specific function with a formula I don't know what qualifies. The street legal part of a super car is not inherently different than the 1.6L FI hybrid engine regulations of Formula 1, it's just a different set of constraints. You do not create a winning street legal super car without knowledge, innovation, creativity, determinism, enthusiasm - and by proxy of those joy, competition, and playfulness. I simply do not understand the gate keeping here. If it's not your thing, fair enough. But please do not invalidate the joy of others because it is real to them. It's comparable to an mechanical watch. You can make a digital watch significantly better at time keeping and all the other functions, that is substantially cheaper both to produce and maintain. But if mechanical precision devices make your world go around, then I can appreciate that - I'm just not going to pay $10k yearly to maintain an elaborate mechanical wristwatch.