Why does you Disk Drive work?

[MaggieL]

Originally posted by tw
IOW do we adults even know of those laymen basics (quarks, bosoms, etc) that are fundamental to a growing American economy?

How indeed?

Actually, I do know something about bosoms--I have two. :-)

Seriously, quantum physics aren't fundamental to our economy any more than a thousand other subspecialties are. Modern engineering allows us to *use* technologies without understanding all their component parts in detail. At some point as a practical matter you hav e to draw a conceptual line, and treat all components of whatever it is you're using that fall below that line as "black boxes", with known, defined properties, into whose inner working one does not inquire in depth, leaving that level of detail to the people at the black box factory.

In my life experience with technology, as software engineer, pilot, amateur radio operator, and fairly well-rounded geek, one of the most important things to have a sense for in understanding how tech works, is knowing when to switch from a "depth-first" to a "breadth-first" traversal of the tree of concepts and components you're currently working on.

When I use my computer, I *know* about shift registers and logic gates. I know how they work and what they do. But I *don't* use that knowlege while working at a completely different level.

The public schools have long concentrated on producing a large volume of mediocre product at low cost. Smart kids who are curious and engaged in the world around them still happen...two of them are mine. The both have a good handle on mathematics, engineering and basic science, although that's due to their parents more than to their school system.

But what really distingushes them is their ability to use language fluently and accurately....and maybe *that* isn't an upstream swim in the schools of today. For some clues as to why that is, I commend to your attention the writings of one Richard Michell,


The Underground Grammarian