All The Significant Inventions/Discoveries Were Long Ago

How much would the economy really be hurt if society went back to cathode-ray tube screens and projector screens, incandescent and arc discharge lighting?

Yes, it's a more "primitive" technology, but it worked perfectly fine. Society was already in the modern age with those things.

 

I personally think computer technology has kind of stalled since the year 2000 or 2005. What can ordinary computers do now that they could not back then?

 

uh huh. I don't think you know how things are manufactured.

Easy. a 5nm mosfet. The first silicon transistor would fill the palm of your hand. Now we can fit a billion of them on your finger nail. Can't be done with traditional cutting tools.
Need more?

 

I don't think you know how these technologies work either.

The efficiency created by our better technologies allows the resources we saved to be used for other purposes. Go back, and you lose that efficiency. The economy is driven by increasing efficiency, not decreasing it.

 

One of the problems with how technology is presented is that people actually believe it is going to improve their lives. This has fostered the notion that nothing is ever good enough [which is the EXACT opposite of how it really is].

Everything is perfect in each moment. How could it be any other way?

 

Let's think about digital electronics.

In order for you to communicate digitally you need a discrete signal, a 1 or a 0. These are represented by voltages. 3.3v or 0v in CMOS logic. There's an area between those two voltages that is undefined. Meaning your data is corrupted if the voltage is 1.7 when the clock signal triggers. Could be a 1. Could be a 0. These ones and zeros are shifted through your logic circuits at the speed of the clock signal. 3GHz means a shift happens 3 billion times a second. Vacuum tubes can switch at no more than 1MHz, and they are analog. They do not produce discrete signals at 1MHz. That means you have to read the signal from the vacuum tube much more slowly. Eniac's clock speed was 100kHz and it often could only run for a few minutes before a technician had to go hunting for a series of burnt out tubes. It's longest uptime was 4 days. How many seconds do you think it would take us today to process the full amount of data Eniac processed in those 4 days? Do you think our ability to rapidly process information using a low amount of energy might have an affect on the economy?

 

No, mass media was WAY MORE recognized back then.

Without the technology for wacko->millions communication, our information got filtered by major media outlets - the tv stations, the major newspapers, and magazines.

Back then, for a TV station or newspaper to make a mistake was a HUGE DEAL. It damaged their profitability. News personalities (like Dan Rather) could get drubbed out of their careers for making a mistake.

Today, there is ZERO gate keeping. The result is that Dr. Oz, and the rest of the ideocracy can broadcast absolute crap, because it is "free speech". Of course "free speech" is great, but there is no way to fully combat this deluge of totally false information.

 

The factories being designed and operated today are using individuals with college degrees in mechanical engineering and related fields.

I'm sure these factories need some labor to fill various gaps. But, those jobs are the jobs that manufacturers are trying to eliminate.

I'm not disputing your story about the 14yo kid. But, that is NOT how Americans are being employed.

I fully agree that our work to make college impossibly expensive is damage being done to America. That move started with Reagan, and ever since then we've seen less and less interest in education in America.

That is not true in other countries. And, we are going to pay for that failure.

 

I'm not sure what your point is here.

 

I'm telling you your assumption is wrong.

The engineers are all riding desks designing equipment. The people in the factory installing, operating, and maintaining the equipment are mainly electro mechanical techs and machinists that got their education over a lifetime on the job. If they learned g-code in a classroom it wasn't for a degree. It was because the shop installed a new Mazak. This generation of tech savvy factory support is aging out. They are being replaced, not with engineers, but auto mechanics, operators, electricians, HVAC guys, etc.

I talk with manufacturers daily and all of them are begging for students with nothing more than a basic working knowledge of automated systems. If you spend a year of study on the basics, you'll have a job learning beside the guys that are still in the field. They need you now before the old guys retire. Degree, no degree, all they care about is the desire and ability to learn how they do things in their specific practice.

 

I'm responding to the false idea that there's not a great deal of difference between the analog computing of the 50's and modern digital systems. In many ways they are completely different things.

I was asked why CRT and arc lighting isn't just as good as LED.

The answer is, faster, lower energy cost, wider applications. Processing that took days now takes seconds. You can't use a CRT as a sensor, or an HMI, or a digital switch, or a logic device, or an isolator. I should have just asked why do you need CRT when paintings worked just as good?

I was asked what the big deal with lasers is.

The answer is the ability to manufacture smaller, more precise components (the difference between ENIAC and the processor in your cell phone), produce components from materials that could not previously exist, etc.

 

I'm all in favor of career education. HClinton had a plan that was significant in that direction.

As you point out, nearly every career area is advancing, and staying on the bus can require vocational education.

But, there is a significant gap between auto mechanics and automated factories.

https://automationtechies.com/what-are-automation-companies-looking-for-in-their-employees/

Note that that article isn't even discussing what manufacturing is looking for in terms of those able to design, build and operate the factory.

Tesla factory:

There are still humans.

 

OIC. I should have looked back in the thread!

I'm more concerned about ensuring America's kids are prepared for the job market they will face. And, for having the education facilities for keeping up with the increasingly fast progress that is being made.

 

Not really that significant. Your car is an automated system. If you have an understanding of how the closed loop electrical system in your car works to control mechanical function of the car you're 90% of the way to understanding how factory control works. Digital Electrical logic exists in many fields that quickly port into manufacturing.

 

My father was an EE professor. Way way back, the school had an experimental analog computer. As a youngster, he let me play with it a little. I could program it to play tic tac toe. Programming was done with patch cords!

I would ask my dad where that could possibly go.

 

The reality is the field changes quite rapidly. Employers are looking for sponges that quickly learn new concepts. A good background is nice, but by the time you've finished your degree there's 6 new ways of doing things.

 

I don't accept that as well paying career opportunity.

These are the jobs that modern manufacturing is working to eliminate, as we've seen in auto manufacturing. Compare the Tesla plant to the human intensity of manufacturing as done by US auto not so long ago that workers of today actually worked in those plants.

 

Many of those advances are coming out of mechanical engineering schools.

 

I totally disagree and I have the student placement to prove it.

If the conveyor system at Amazon goes down Amazon loses thousands of dollars a second. They pay loads of money to the people able to make sure that never happens. Smart factory systems aren't just monitoring the quality of the output product. They monitor the quality and efficiency of the system producing that product. Manufacturing systems will always wear and they will always require human attention to maintain. Automated systems are good at repeatability. Humans are good at rapid unique tasks.

They don't want to get rid of humans. They just want to pay them less than the thousands of dollars a second they lose without them.

 

Yup, but the guy that actually installs it is the dude that would smoke joints out behind woodshop.

 

I'd keep that off the resume!

 

Last month a guy from a very well known bakery came in. He offered 34 an hour for a level 1 tech. That's someone that can read a schematic, knows what ohm's law is, knows what a PLC is and can read ladder logic.

I can teach you that in a few months.

 

Remember the Tesla shop manager quote. They are constantly designing improvements to their manufacturing automation.

Those are the guys making good money.

 

Great!

How long before the bakery doesn't have to hire someone for that?

 

It can't happen. AI isn't a regenerative system. It's failure points are adaptive and that requires human adaptivity to mitigate. It's like asking how long until humans don't need medical care.

We can certainly automate some of the repetitive medical problems humans face, but doing so will simply change the medical needs we have.