Blog - All Comments

RE: Heat Exposure Can Affect Students' Ability to Learn, and The Rest of Us?

DAB — Thu, 07 Aug 2025 19:23:25 GMT

This study is about 60 years late.

Those of us who went to schools that were not air conditioned could have given the same assessment without the cost of the study.

RE: Engineer at the Movies: reviews... Passengers (2016)

KRTurk — Sat, 22 Feb 2025 11:42:44 GMT

The reason that Jim didn't immediately awaken another engineer was because the repeated accidents didn't start happening until after he awakened Aurora. I think the idea was that two people using the systems caused the deterioration to happen faster.

The idea that they needed special equipment to put people back to sleep and didn't carry it on board was a pretty cheap plot trick, however.

I would have changed the ending by having them put Gus in the medical stasis pod so that he could be cured in a hospital when they arrived. That would solve the problem of both the "disposable third character" and also why Aurora didn't accept the pod for herself.

But I agree, this ship was too stupid to fly. The passengers should all sock the company with a class action lawsuit for being put in such unnecessary danger.

RE: Celebrating 100 Years of Women Engineers and Electricity in the Home with Electric Dreams 2024

bidrohini — Wed, 18 Dec 2024 08:14:52 GMT

Very interesting topic. It took only women to understand the importance of electricity in households.

RE: Researchers Claim EMF Can Enhance an Individual's Flow State in the Brain

DAB — Thu, 10 Oct 2024 18:40:54 GMT

It is not just EMF, but you can also include photon flow as a problem for humans.

As with EMF, photon exposure causes subtle effects to some humans.

Your genetics determine your susceptibility, so unless you know for certain you are not affected, you should proceed with caution.

RE: Researchers Claim EMF Can Enhance an Individual's Flow State in the Brain

bidrohini — Wed, 09 Oct 2024 15:03:12 GMT

Thanks for sharing this article.

RE: Statue of Christa McAuliffe Unveiled at New Hampshire State House Grounds

rscasny — Fri, 20 Sep 2024 18:36:32 GMT

I was in the Navy teaching a class when a fellow teacher rushed into the classroom and told us about the disaster. I stopped the class. Everyone -- staff, admin and instructors -- were bummed out. The space shuttle was labeled as experimental. But none of use thought about the problem with the o-rings until.... it happened. As I think about it, I'm still bummed about it. I'm glad they kept the Starliner astronauts up there if they didn't think it was safe.

RE: Unexplained Engineering Mysteries: Team Uses Surveying Equipment to Detect the Loch Ness Monster

mp2100 — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 01:47:23 GMT

I saw nessie when we visited 10 years ago. German tourists parked next to us at the loch and pulled their puppet dinosaur out of their van, and put her in the water. I have un-doctored photos as proof.

RE: John B. Goodenough, Inventor Of Lithium-Ion Battery, Has Died At 100 Years Old

Jan Cumps — Tue, 27 Jun 2023 19:50:11 GMT

[View:https://youtu.be/6ROwVrF0Ceg:640:360]

RE: WW2 Codebreakers to Be Recognized with Plaque In St. Paul

Andrew J — Sat, 17 Jun 2023 13:00:26 GMT

There’s a lot in The Imitation Game that isn’t correct. That’s fine, it’s a movie designed to entertain and the actual story would have made for a dull 2 hours! You can get some idea of the practicalities and realities of breaking Enigma and using the information gleaned from it though. The Bombe isn’t in any sense a computer, but a fancy circuit tester: when the circuit goes open, there’s an indication of a possible solution to one encrypted message (and thus all messages on that Enigma network for 24 hours - upwards of 70 networks, all using different settings.) Incidentally, and more in relation to code breaking in the US, when the German submarine fleet moved to a 4 rotor Enigma, the British developed a 4 drum Bombe machine - an adaptation of the 3 drum machine - but these were mostly built/modified and run by the US Navy who concentrated on Submarine traffic leaving the British to concentrate on other networks.

Turing and the team at Bletchley were originally using mathematical techniques, building on the work of Polish cryptographers, to break Enigma (which had changed since the Polish first broke it) but this was way too slow to be of use. Turing did envisage a machine to do this and worked with Harold ‘Doc’ Keene, Chief Engineer at the British Tabulating Machine company in Letchworth who actually built the machine(s) - Turing definitely did not lock himself in a shed and build it! Also, it required another mathematician, Gordon Welchman, to have the insight that actually made the machine practical and without whom the whole project may well have been abandoned (maybe Turing would have come up with the insight eventually.)

For a real consideration of the earliest computer (arguable it seems) used for code breaking, see Colossus and the breaking of the German Lorenz cipher, again at Bletchley Park. That is a truly amazing story of mathematical genius.

Not taking away from what the US cryptologists did of course, their recognition is well deserved; nor indeed the work of Von Neumann and ENIAC for calculating ballistic trajectories and defining a hardware architecture that has stood the test of time.

The UK had a not dissimilar trajectory of companies that formed and merged throughout the 50s and 60s, resulting in ICL (as one example). Some of the most interesting stories come from the early pre-standards days (decimal computers and CRTs as RAM anyone?)

RE: NASA's UAP Investigation Lackluster in Its Findings

dougw — Fri, 02 Jun 2023 20:09:12 GMT

Our distance from Mars is changing at about 48000 kph right now?

RE: Two High School Students Present New Proof For Pythagoras' Theorem

dougw — Mon, 03 Apr 2023 19:18:01 GMT

Sometimes it takes a young mind to not "know" something is impossible and try it anyway..

RE: Engineer at the Movies: reviews... Yu-Gi-Oh! The Dark Side of Dimensions (2017) - aka, crazy engineer plays a card game

NilAny — Thu, 25 Aug 2022 02:39:13 GMT

Hi, I came across and bookmarked this review four years ago, but somehow didn't realise this is published on Element14 community until today [emoticon:d6dd260102fd406884fc96b8bc59760b] As an engineer I also feel Kaiba Corp's tech in this film impressed. Would you mind I translate and repost this on my blog? I'll credit you and this link.

RE: Engineer at the Movies – Reviews – Justice League 2017 & 2021 — Right Arm of the Batman

Andrew J — Wed, 24 Mar 2021 10:25:45 GMT

JL was on UK tv on Monday. I think you’re being a bit harsh: I would rate it 1.39. I do agree that the Flash running was a bit bizarre - I think he needs some Steve Austin sound effects.

RE: EatM: Reviews – Star Wars The Last Jedi – “I find your lack of montages disturbing"

dubbie — Tue, 01 Dec 2020 11:04:25 GMT

I saw the first Star Wars movie as a student, in the worst flea pit cinema in town with the smallest capacity. It was run back to back for what must have been 24 hours a day for weeks. I've no idea why it ran in such a small cinema when there were much bigger places available.

I was just blown away by the special, effects and story line. I've always been a science fiction fan and I found this film just mind bogglingly amazing. Not so much the sequels but then that is always the fate of sequels. I haven't even watched all of the sequels, even when they were on TV.

Dubbie

RE: TV Series and Movies for Engineers to Watch During the Pandemic

beacon_dave — Tue, 14 Apr 2020 19:02:48 GMT

Seeing as it is the 50th anniversary

Apollo 13: Home Safe

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM8kjDF0IJU

"...This 30-minute documentary features interviews with Apollo 13 Astronauts Jim Lovell and Fred Haise, as well as Flight Directors Gene Kranz and Glynn Lunney, with engineer Hank Rotter..."

Apollo 13: ‘Houston, We’ve Had a Problem’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MdvoA-sjs0A

"...On the 50th Anniversary of the Apollo 13 mission, we recognize the triumph of the mission control team and the astronauts, and look at the lessons learned..."