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The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

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Re: The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

#12
post #6

Wow. History hasn't been kind. As is often the case around limited-mindset thinking. From TFA: "civil authorities said that “Dr Warren’s instrument has little immediate direct use in civil aircraft.” The Royal Australian Air Force likewise decided that “such a device is not required—the recorder would yield more expletives than explanations.” Well. No. Multiple air crashes across the world relied on recordings as a k…

Fourth: in retrospect, it is seen as obvious :)

Re: The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

#14

The black box has worked well for all in Common Law countries. In countries with French-style law, that might be different for pilots. (Essentially you're guilty until proven innocent, and they hire a retired judge with nothing better to do except to drag out the hearings (and fees) until they die.) However the scale has tipped recently in the US with a central pilot records database being created recently. So at eve…

> $200,000 on a college education and pilot training, they need to think about both losing their medical at any time

In my country Loss of License insurance removes that as a risk for pilots.

Re: The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

#15
post #5

This inventor is probably joined by many others before him that had the same idea, were shrugged off and did not have the tenacity to follow up despite that. Another example for what is common wisdom: Execution is everything. The myth of the inventor-founder is something from the industrual age. Interesting how it still persists.

This is not a myth, but History recording real facts that happened.

Anyone can imagine a "flying car" or a "nuclear fusion reactor". It is a completely different thing having and putting the resources to work: the people, the effort, the money and the time to make something real.

Someone just "having an idea" only works in science fiction, and even there you need to do the work of writing the book, or drawing the comic.

Re: The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

#16
post #5

This inventor is probably joined by many others before him that had the same idea, were shrugged off and did not have the tenacity to follow up despite that. Another example for what is common wisdom: Execution is everything. The myth of the inventor-founder is something from the industrual age. Interesting how it still persists.

Why is it a myth? Whenever I read about the founding of a big name company there's very often a significant innovation that it's initially premised on. Disney - animated feature length film with sound, dogged vision of founder Post / Kelloggs - invention of breakfast cereal, invented by founder (Kellogg's invention stolen by Post) Carnegie steel - bridge prototype, highly risky and innovative endeavor Ford - division…

Mass production and factories had already been a thing for almost a century when Ford started his factories. It is like saying that the new innovation "computers" was behind Facebooks success.

Re: The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

#19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it a myth? Whenever I read about the founding of a big name company there's very often a significant innovation that it's initially premised on. Disney - animated feature length film with sound, dogged vision of founder Post / Kelloggs - invention of breakfast cereal, invented by founder (Kellogg's invention stolen by Post) Carnegie steel - bridge prototype, highly risky and innovative endeavor Ford - division…

Mass production and factories had already been a thing for almost a century when Ford started his factories. It is like saying that the new innovation "computers" was behind Facebooks success.

[deleted]

Re: The inventor of the black box was told to drop the idea

#20
post #6

Wow. History hasn't been kind. As is often the case around limited-mindset thinking. From TFA: "civil authorities said that “Dr Warren’s instrument has little immediate direct use in civil aircraft.” The Royal Australian Air Force likewise decided that “such a device is not required—the recorder would yield more expletives than explanations.” Well. No. Multiple air crashes across the world relied on recordings as a k…

I guess one possible explanation is that having a black box in your plane is not useful to you, only for other people after you die. Pushing for the idea requires accepting you are going to screw up and some people will think that your job is preventing the airplane from crashing in the first place. It's obviously useful in the long term from a societal perspective, not from a short-term and individual point of view.
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