Notably, it was not a super advanced weapon of mass destruction that brought the Cold War to a close, but a chain of human protests and demonstrations that rose to cause the USSR to implode. It turned out that the priority shouldn't have been focusing on something more devastating than an atomic bomb.
Instead of trying to forge shock-based weapons systems, we should be looking to use technology and engineering to help improve the quality of life of the everyday human. I think what Dr. Goldberg is trying to say is more than anything, today we are not living in a world where the goal is to survive. We are living in an era where we have the ability to thrive.
The Missing Basics is perhaps the difference between the mindsets of engineers trying to stay alive and engineers trying to improve life. "Improving life" sounds broad, and indeed it is; therefore we need creativity and diligence, what I interpret as an umbrella for the Missing Basics.
These MB are:
- How to ask questions
- How to label data
- How to model
- How to decompose big problems
- How to measure
- How to communicate
Communication
I know this much about myself: I think faster than I talk, and when I talk, I stop thinking. I often find that people I work with find it hard to understand what I mean, and they ask me what I mean. When I try to explain (talk) I stop thinking and even I sometimes lose track of what I'm trying to explain. This happens the most often in Math discussions.
I'm taking 2 courses that have discussion sections, so this semester I definitely plan to practice talking - a lot.
Asking Questions
I am interested in many areas of technology. One of them is naturally the television. When we still had the bulky cathode ray TVs around, I remember wishing that I could jump into the world on TV. How could I make it feel more real? How could I make TV better? At the time, I could find no answers to such questions (in my defense, I was 10) but of course, great engineers have answered those two questions time and time again, as we have seen with the continuous improvement of televisions, from cathode ray, to plasma, to LCD, and now the newest trend LED. LED TVs are the most energy efficient, brightest, thinnest, lightest, and most pleasant to view televisions to date. Well, I'm quite sure the engineers at Toshiba, Samsung, Sony, etc. didn't just ask "how could this be better?" I'd like to find out what they were asking.
There are no brilliant opportunities for me to get into a team of great engineers at the moment, let alone the thought of just observing them work and think. But, as I proceed with some degree of creativity in making a steam car with my team, I will get lots of practice in asking questions, and practice, eventually, makes perfect.
Breaking down big problems
Especially in the last few years of high school, I have met numerous roadblocks. Several times, I passed these by luck, others, I was stopped dead in my tracks. In retrospect, what did hold me back was trivial - if only I had seen the inner workings of these roadblocks. If I could see the reasons why the roadblock existed in the first place, then essentially I would know what was keeping such roadblocks standing in place. Then, bit by bit, it would be possible to start unscrewing here, cutting the string there, until eventually the roadblock collapses.
In my extra-curricular activities (yet to be finalized) I expect to meet many such roadblocks. I have found that student organizations tend to encounter the most of these, so my goal is to find my way to a leadership position in an RSO, or at least know what the leaders of the RSO are doing to overcome any obstacles they encounter, thus learning new ways to decompose problems.
Cheers,
The idea that engineering nowadays is no longer used to help society survive as much as it is helping society thrive was a very interesting point that caught my attention from the start. I very much agree with this point of view due to the fact that technology and health care has become so advanced in today’s world that surviving is becoming less of an issue. Engineers are now, like you said, turning their attention to improving the comforts in and quality of life, in other words, helping it thrive. Although I very much like and agree with this statement I feel that engineering will never fully move away from helping society survive. The reason I say this is due to the fact that resources on Earth are limited, and unless new technologies come out to reduce our consumption or we master space travel and occupy a second planet we will someday become extinct. As of today’s world, in the short term, Engineers are allowed to focus mainly on the comfort of humanity; however, in the long term, I believe it will always be a fight for survival, and with the help of programs such as NASA and companies such as Siemens every day we come a little bit closer to a long term answer.
ReplyDeleteAs for your goals and methods used in order to achieve them I find them very complete and possible. My goals are along the same lines as well. I personally have a hard time articulating what I wish to say because my tongue gets heavier the faster I talk. So when I am really excited about a project or I figured out how to solve a math problem and I try to explain it to my group, all that comes out is a mess of incoherent words. Overall I enjoyed reading your plan on developing your “missing basics” and I hope your plan succeeds.
I liked now you opened with an example from the cold war. This intro is very fitting to the topic of engineering, because as engineers we take concepts and apply them to real-world cases. Also, I completely agree that improving society and the live's of others should be an engineer's priority which I believe you were getting at when you gave the example of the cold war.
ReplyDeleteYour definition of the missing basics is the same as mine, and like you I believe that they are absolutely essential to thrive in the workplace. I think it is great that you have selected certain areas to improve in. I especially agree with your choice of communication. Communication is a critical skill in any profession, and one that is all too often undervalued in an engineering education.
What you wrote about televisions and asking questions shows me that you were born to be an engineer. Your inquisitive mind will take you far. Just remember that there are more opportunities than you think to get involved in research with brilliant engineers early on. After all, we are students at UIUC. On the topic of decomposing problems, I completely agree with you. Whats more, I think that applying these skills as a member of different RSO's is a great idea. I would urge you to get involved quickly.
Overall, we are in agreement about the importance of the missing basics. By reading your blog, I can tell that you understand that not all of the missing basics can be taught in the classroom. You have outlined a variety of goals both in and out of the classroom and I encourage you to pursue those your freshman year.
I am really impressed by your opening paragraphs. Connecting the Cold War to the Missing Basics was a novel idea and it shows how strong of a writer you are. I agree that the focus of engineering should be shifted from these things that merely let us "survive" to ideas and things that let us "thrive."
ReplyDeleteI have exactly the same problem when trying to explain my ideas to others and in math I think it's the worst. It's really difficult to think about something and explain it and still keep the road map in my head saying this is where my explanation is leading.
If you could come up with a way to make those ten-year-old questions true, you would be set for life. The ability to ask simple questions with profound implications can be a very helpful skill as an engineer. Did you know that now there are people working on making televisions made with flexible displays so that they can be rolled up and stored in small spaces, like in a cell phone or a thin tube? This would make the standard television ultra portable. I thought you might be interested this, it's certainly caught my interest.
The ability to work around road blocks is a very useful skill as well and being able to decompose them could give you insights into solving these problems that no one else has seen or thought of. I think that if you work on all of the skills you say you want to improve upon, you will be in good shape for your college career and beyond.
First of all I really like the way you have organized this blog and the fact that you spent so much time working on it. This really shows how important engineering is for you. I also like how your goals are very specific and that you elaborate on them. One problem that you identified that I can really relate to is the problem solving area. My major is computer science and problem solving is pretty critical in this area. Often times we have to spend hours debugging and trying to make computers do what we want them to do. I think that once you get this skill you will have an upper hand wherever you go.
ReplyDeleteYou also mentioned asking questions and communicating. I agree with you completely on this. Asking the right questions can be really critical because it shows that you are thinking a lot about the task at hand. I think that teachers and professors will also be impressed if you can ask really good questions and show that you are thinking about the subject matter. Therefore I definitely agree with you that this is a very critical skill.