The "not invented here" syndrome

Oh, but one look in the guy's eyes shortly after that experience would show that SOMETHING happened! That "deer in the headlights" look.

Jon

Hell, no! Tesla was the "idea man" and Charles P. Steinmetz was the guy who worked out all the deep theory. As a team, they were incredible. Westinghouse would have remained in the railway brake business without them. Everything Westinghouse did in the (very) late 1800's up until 1910 or even later came from them.

Jon

Why, the Chinese are way ahead of you! They've been doing this for some years.

Jon

Well, he has to wait until the next government auction is going!

Jon

Steinmetz -- one of my heros. He was great w/o Tesla. For example, he figured out the energy in lightning by analyizing a mirror shattered by lightning.

Tesla was also great, considering he considered himself intellectually inferior to his older brother, who died when both were young. I've often wondered about what the Tesla brothers would have been able to acheive.

That is a tribute to Mr. Westinghouse. "A" people hire "A" people. "B" or "C" people hire "B" or "D" people, as they don't want basic competiton. Westinghouse constricted his (well deserved, IMHO) ego enough to get Steinmetz on staff.

For a modern comparison, what if Bill Gates and Steve Jobs were on the same team? As a long-time computer programmer and user, I certainly wish they had been able to work together!

-- Mark

I have not had the occasion to inspect Iggy's asshole nor, am I obliquely hinting for an invitation to do so.

Now, unless Iggy has a muscle-wired sphincter, I would venture a guess that his asshole is no greater and no less than any other and your post is without metal content and could be construed as an attempt to incite discord and gain attention.

I need a Black Max pulley.

b.

The code would have been just as crappy but the advertising campaigns would be better.

For my money from an engineering perspective its an insult to Westinghouse, Steinmetz and Tesla to propose any comparison with Gates other than illustrating opposite ends of the spectrum.

Gregm

My 20+ year-old memories are clicking in, perhaps correctly. ;-) IIRC Westinghouse bought the company Steinmetz worked for simply to get him on staff. Steinmetz refused to quit the American company that gave him a chance.

BTW:

1. There might not have been the USA national electrical power grid without Steinmetz. He figured out how to keep lightning from buring out generators.

1. Steinmetz had physical problems.
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   he chose to use his brainpower to help people.

IMO w/o Steinmetz or someone of similar brainpower, there would be no internet, as there would be no national power grids.

Comments?

-- Mark

Hey Leo, you posted:

"> I haven't found anyone yet who likes my idea, but, maybe in this group. I

I like your idea, but in some cases it is already being done. The drugs employed in execution by lethal injection are carefully selected to not harm the body's organs. This allows them to be havested for transplant only moments after death is declared.

With regard to humane execution, arguably properly conducted lethal injection is likely the most humane. I've undergone general anesthesia

5 times in the past two years, and I have to confess the experience is somewhat pleasant. At one moment you're perfectly awake and talking to the doctor, then suddenly you're awake again but it's 2 or 4 hours later. I suspect that the experience is very much like death, except from death you obviously don't wake up.

On the downside, this is too good for the criminals who deserve and have earned a death sentence. I'd prefer to see them face the horror of the noose, gas chamber, or electric chair. Even these methods are to kind to them in my estimation, so I believe their exists some justification for the ancient practice of drawing and quartering, or beheading by 100 slow strokes of the knife across the throat.

Yes, I know that I am a cruel bastard at heart, but I definitely believe that many criminals deserve a death more draconic than simply a humane execution.

In today's world I suppose that I would not be considered politically correct, but some of these criminal bastards deserve to receive a slow and agonizing death!

Now that I've said that, I feel better.

Harry C.

Leo Lichtman wrote:

Indeed. History is written by the "victors".

Greg -- I'm not looking to make a fight. But why do you think Gates is opposite from the early 19th century genusuii? (If that's a word.) Edison thought he was "THE MAN." Westinghouse, OTOH, hired other talent. IMU Bill G. has bought many people/companies to fill in missing pieces in the MS offerings.

-- Mark

I couldn't agree more. What MSFT puts out the door is a joke to engineering of any kind and especially if you think they are 'professional'

b

Actually Canada used the guilllotine once, and only once.

The execution was flawed, and to conclude the execution, the criminal's head had to be severed using a pen knife that was at hand. It was a public execution, and on seeing what took place, it is reported that many of the spectators vomited in the street.

That's why Canada never again employed the guillotine.

Check your history.

Harry C.

Ignoramus13628 wrote:

Steinmetz worked for Eickemeyer's, which was purchased by General Electric shortly after the merger of Thomson-Houston and Edison General around 1892. GE was aware of Steinmetz's work on an improved traction engine for a trolley car, but that was probably not the main reason for buying the company. Steinmetz was a major contributor to GE's R&D laboratory formed in

1900.

Ref: Kline, Ronald, "Steinmetz, Engineer and Socialist" 1992, also see Hughes, Thomas, Networks of Power, 1983, Carlson, Innovation as a Social Process

Mark,

I would like to answer, too.

Anyone who has ever been in a real, engineering environment where 'responsibility and quality' go hand-in-hand, would laugh at these dweebs in the Northwest.

On the same hand, I agree that MSFT filled a need by simply being at the right place with the goods and at the right time.

I know software engineers that could have made Gates look like a buffoon at the time but they didn't write the first o.s. for the p.c. or what was then Imsai's and Mits.

b

Jeez, the Canucks really screwed that one up big-time. How are they at slicing bologna?

-- Ed Huntress

Harold, that painless method of execution is alread employed by most states in the US. It's called Lethal Injection.

The greatest objection to this method as raised by some people, it's too kind and gentle, and essentialy equivalent to what many of us have already experienced in a hospital during general anathesia.

Another method that is horrifying to look at is electrocution. It looks far worse than what the criminal experiences. The most painful part of that method of execution is being shown the electric chair itself, which is intentionally very gothic in appearance, then being strapped into it. As a student taking a tour through the New Jersey State Prison in Trenton, we were shown the electric chair used there. Just seeing that thing would certainly deter any sane person from a life in crime!

Still, as a physicist and and amatuer studen of physiology, I can reasonably assure anyone that after that first jolt of electricity passes through your brain, you will be incapable of feeling anything. So it is humane, except for the psychological effects of seeing and being seated in the electric chair -- which arguably is how it should be.

You may reasonable ask why I know this. That's a fair question so I'll explain how I know this. During my senior year in high school back in the 1950s I was repairing TV sets to earn college money. One day while holding on to the chassis of a TV set, my head accidentally contacted the high voltage charged anode of one of those metal CRTs. I felt absolutely nothing, except for the fact that when I woke up I was on the floor across the room with my back against the wall. Every part of my body hurt so much that I could barely stand up.

It was only in retrospect that I figured out what had happened. Trust me in telling you that it never happened again. That's why I believe that death by electrcution as done in prisons is painless.

Harry C.

Harold and Susan Vordos wrote:

Carbon monoxide

i

I have no objection to the above.

i