BS: Trompe

Subject: BS: Trompe
From: gnu
Date: 03 May 15 - 09:00 PM

TROMPE!

I FUCKING love this lecture! This reminds me of many of my professors back in that day when wise wo/men were revered for their knowledge, experience and their ability to impart knowledge at such a grass roots level. Hear hear! Bravo!

Seriously... watch the whole thing. It's entertaining as well as educational for those who don't know. And please share it. Us old and crusty engineers and scientists deserve a modicum of respect even though the corporate and political elite silence us in media and beyond for their greedy agendas.

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 May 15 - 09:27 PM

It's a fascinating lecture. Lots of funny little tidbits along the way. Thanks! (You'll see I pushed it out via Hootsuite).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 04 May 15 - 06:34 AM

Compressed air technology is still widely used and developed further by "high-tech" engineers; thus the lecturer seems too pessimistic to me.

It is correct though that the public discussion on energy problems is highly marked by vested interests. It is a solid fact that ecologically neutral energy can be produced very cheaply with existing technology, in amounts exceeding the needs of all mankind by far. Those who deny that are either deceived or liars. (In comparison, the prediction of global warming is only based on very plausible hypotheses.)

In particular, the overall costs of nuclear plants are being understated intentionally, because they seem to be payable only in the "distant" future, or in sufficiently improbable disaster cases. Today's investors hope that someone else will pay in the end, and politicians have even less incentive to plan ahead, unless their voters demand it forcefully.

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 04 May 15 - 06:58 AM

PS: "Greedy" is not the best word to approach the problem. If investors lie to increase their profit, they are ordinary liars. If politicians or journalists believe those lies, they are stupid or criminally lazy. If they spread the lies in spite of better knowledge, or intentionally ignore the truth, they are corrupt.

Greedy people should invest in ecologically neutral energy. Capital is abundant and cheap at the moment.

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: Musket
Date: 04 May 15 - 09:07 AM

"People who deny" some scientific hypothesis are liars?

You don't seem to have got the hang of this science thing, have you Grishka?

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 04 May 15 - 09:43 AM

People who flatly deny existing technology and economics are plainly wrong. (There is of course the possibility that I have been wrongly informed about facts, but I know of no critic who points at one of those technologies and claims that it is a fraud. All technologies have their drawbacks, to be sure. Compressed air technology which is too loud for many applications.)

You don't seem to have got the hang of exact reading, have you, Musket?

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 May 15 - 10:33 AM

And for the music side of the audience...

Un elephant, sa trompe, sa trompe
Un elephant, ca trompe enormement

(One elephant, its trunk, its trunk, one elephant, it deceives enormously)

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: Musket
Date: 04 May 15 - 11:15 AM

Still a hypothesis. Still got to make that leap from potential to practical.

The only time such words as deny, fraud and liar creep in is when the God botherers inject nonsense into science.

That's hot air rather than compressed air..

(I spent years trying to wean process engineering off compressed air as it is inefficient and costly, but the limitations weren't scientific. Just that buying cheap air driven or expensive hydraulic or electric devices came out of capital budgets, running huge compressors tended to come out of overhead budgets. I was fucked, and not a denier in site.)

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: GUEST,Grishka
Date: 04 May 15 - 12:55 PM

Musket, as usually you are way off. Blatant liars for financial reasons are a fact of life, and they have become more unashamed in recent decades. Building up a good reputation is no longer considered a good business idea.

Cheap and large-scale renewable energy is an established reality, e.g. in Germany, where I live. (Electricity is still expensive for ordinary users who do not own a roof with a solar panel, but that is political.) Suppliers keep complaining and predicting the collapse of German and European economy, of course, as they did before.

Compressed air is the topic of the OP, not my personal best bet.

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: olddude
Date: 04 May 15 - 01:56 PM

Not my favorite solution, I suspect it will come from light. We touched a child's understanding so far

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: Musket
Date: 04 May 15 - 02:10 PM

Presumably why I mentioned compressed air.

You are no bloody fun Grishka. Take a leaf out of Keith's book. He crawls up the wall first time.

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: gnu
Date: 04 May 15 - 03:31 PM

OP... "I FUCKING love this lecture! This reminds me of many of my professors back in that day when wise wo/men were revered for their knowledge, experience and their ability to impart knowledge at such a grass roots level. Hear hear! Bravo!"

I remember "Smilie" Stevens. He'd walk in and ask, "Any questions?" He'd look around and, if there were no questions, he would smile (looked like a frog when he did)and walk out.

Then there was "Torf" Torffason. First day, he entered the hall by the door stage left of the lectern dressed as a Spanish swordsman (jaunty flat hat with a red feather and all), brandishing an epee. As he thrusted and parried his way to the lectern, he spouted mathematics and physics equations with an English accent in Shakespearean style.

And Chernoff, who, while explaining many mathematical concepts, brought everything back to bah-nah-nahs.

And who could forget Bullet Bob! His chalkboard writing was a work of art and as fast as one could speak. His eyebrows (eyebrow) were so bushy, it seemed he might erase the chalkboard as he moved along.

Then there was... damn... I forget his name! Not a hair out of place. He would be there before we arrived and he would make the chalk fly for the full 50 minutes. Nobody could keep up. The bell would sound and he would announce, "I haven't the time to finish the mathematical derivation of the formula but this is all YOU need to know.", upon which, he would chalk out a simple formula and say, "You kids are lucky."

And Harvey Semple. He'd walk around the drafting lab with a yardstick and pretend he was gonna bat someone in the back of the head with it.

What was the name of the philosophy prof that wore his Toronto Maple Leafs jersey EVERY day? He had a lisp and would always discuss the last game at the beginning of class. When students would comment, he would make them pronounce "Leafs" with a lisp. Great prof. Great guy.

There are more.

Subject: RE: BS: Trompe
From: olddude
Date: 05 May 15 - 01:12 AM

Great lecture gnu. Reminds me of some profs I had