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Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

nautil.us

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Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#11

Post by jaclaz »

shen wrote: post #2

The article title is confusing architects with structural engineers.

Yep, but the issue is that in "modern times" the two professions were divided.

Up to roughly the end of the 19th century (and in some cases even in the early 1900's) an architect was also a structural engineer, and a structural engineer also an architect (and BTW in the classical times the architect was also the structural engineer and the site director, in some cases even the builder/contractor).

The gap between the two professions has become - in my experience - wider, and with the (needed) addition of other professional and "specialized" figures (geologists, plant engineers, etc.) each profession has become narrower in scope, to the point that sometimes it is difficult to have an architect and a structural engineer communicate properly, as they each lack a "global" vision on a project.

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#12

Post by travisjungroth »

tim333 wrote: post #8

I found it interesting wandering around the ancient sites in Egypt to see what survived 4000 years. Granite was the easy winner followed by heaped structures of softer rocks.

The problem with that for architecture is most structures are meant to be occupied, and being inside a heaped structure of softer rocks isn't very nice. I do wish that I got to see a structure meant to last millennia built in my lifetime. On that timescale, I _just_ missed Mount Rushmore.

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#13

Post by jaclaz »

ska wrote: post #3
shen wrote: post #2

The article title is confusing architects with structural engineers.

On the other hand, some architects could stand to learn quite a bit from structural engineers...

>On the other hand, some architects could stand to learn quite a bit from structural engineers...

... and viceversa.

As said above as I see it the real issue is the (modern) separation/specialization of those professions.

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#14

Post by rafiki6 »

waivek wrote: post #4

As a software "engineer", I've always been envious of architects and the well-defined path to mastery that exists in their field. You start off as a lowly apprentice and only through years of study and practice can you progress. As a result, the best architects in the world are generally forty and above and there is a correlation between age and competence. There is no 22 year old rockstar architect. The bar of compe…

This is also the case in software "engineering". Don't assume a code monkey who's 22 and can produce a piece of software with heaps worth of technical debt is a master of anything. The best software engineers in the world are generally mid-career (40-50) and have gone through lots of large projects in several different roles.

Just because our industry doesn't want to acknowledge that, doesn't make it less true.

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#15

Post by rafiki6 »

pgnas wrote: post #10

The megaliths of Bolivia and structures all over the world which man could not replicate prove this. It would seem that the more we turn our back on the natural world and our history, the more we hold ourselves back from break throughs in many areas.

Who says we can't replicate them? It's just not economical to do so and really serves no purpose. The world has generally moved past projects with superstitious/dubious meaning attached to them and does an actual cost/benefit on most large scale endeavors. Except for some developing countries with growing economies who have something to prove.

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#16

Post by vtange »

waivek wrote: post #4

As a software "engineer", I've always been envious of architects and the well-defined path to mastery that exists in their field. You start off as a lowly apprentice and only through years of study and practice can you progress. As a result, the best architects in the world are generally forty and above and there is a correlation between age and competence. There is no 22 year old rockstar architect. The bar of compe…

I'm a software engineer that went through architecture school and I think you're glorifying architects a bit here.

The only reason why architects have a more gradual path as you describe is because there is a LOT of gatekeeping and feedback on your work is a LOT slower.

To become an architect you have to ideally go through schooling at a specific set of schools and then after that you have years of internships where you are at the mercy of the architect who supervises you. If you end up with a not-so-friendly boss you could end up working years of your youth in an unpaid internship and end up NOT getting any credit. That's years of delay to licensure. After getting enough credit and hours you still to take multiple exams, paying out of your own pocket, to get licensed. And unlike software, aspiring architects cannot spend a weekend or two to build projects on their own to put on a portfolio of work, and problems from anything you design can take months or years to crop up.

And even after all that only a tiny minority of architects end up in firms like SOM (like Google but for architects) and get to work in glamourous projects. The vast majority of architects just work on run-of-the-mill housing (not unlike CRUD apps) where the combination of building codes, the client's budget, zoning and other requirements often prevents you from doing anything too flashy.

The great thing about software really is the fact you have the independence and ability to build and publicize your own stuff whereas in all the other formal professions you can't without oversight.

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#17

Post by [deleted] »

segmondy wrote: post #9
waivek wrote: post #4

As a software "engineer", I've always been envious of architects and the well-defined path to mastery that exists in their field. You start off as a lowly apprentice and only through years of study and practice can you progress. As a result, the best architects in the world are generally forty and above and there is a correlation between age and competence. There is no 22 year old rockstar architect. The bar of compe…

Napster was written by a 19yrs old. Bram wrote bittorent when he was 26yrs old. Justin Frankel was 22yrs old when he wrote gnutella with Tom who was 25yrs old. I mention these systems, because these were apps that needed to operate at scale.

[deleted]

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#18

Post by [deleted] »

waivek wrote: post #4

As a software "engineer", I've always been envious of architects and the well-defined path to mastery that exists in their field. You start off as a lowly apprentice and only through years of study and practice can you progress. As a result, the best architects in the world are generally forty and above and there is a correlation between age and competence. There is no 22 year old rockstar architect. The bar of compe…

[deleted]

Re: Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients

#20

Post by rafiki6 »

segmondy wrote: post #9
waivek wrote: post #4

As a software "engineer", I've always been envious of architects and the well-defined path to mastery that exists in their field. You start off as a lowly apprentice and only through years of study and practice can you progress. As a result, the best architects in the world are generally forty and above and there is a correlation between age and competence. There is no 22 year old rockstar architect. The bar of compe…

Napster was written by a 19yrs old. Bram wrote bittorent when he was 26yrs old. Justin Frankel was 22yrs old when he wrote gnutella with Tom who was 25yrs old. I mention these systems, because these were apps that needed to operate at scale.

And they all leveraged some incredible pieces of infrastructure that were built up for them over several years by those with more experience, the primary examples being the Linux Socket library and the TCP/IP protocol.

Building an application that can "scale" doesn't mean it's well built. Modern software engineering sits on the shoulders of giants, especially older ones who came out of research labs.

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