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The Knife Maker

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Re: The Knife Maker

#181

Post by kd0amg »

JabavuAdams wrote: post #177
kd0amg wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can foresee software being able to discern good paintings from bad based purely on supervised learning from examples, with today's technology. Unless we manage strong AI, I expect this effort to get stuck in arguments over feature selection.

Is this so different from the human experience? :P That's not art! Yes it is! ...

Noisy data labeling presents an additional problem, yes, but I was under the impression that there existed techniques for mitigating that problem.

Re: The Knife Maker

#182

Post by tptacek »

ars wrote: post #162
tptacek wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most of the "best" knives are in fact mass-produced. In fact, the knives this guy is talking about, made by "a couple of robots in Germany" aren't "cheap knives"; they're the super expensive heavy full-tang forged Wusthof and Henckel's knives that are themselves kitchen status symbols. But even allowing for that: there are extremely good mass-produced stamped "cheap" knives. Cooks Illustrated's favorite knife is a st…

The best knives I've ever used are these: http://www.harborfreight.com/catalogsearch/result?q=ceramic+... They are incredibly sharp - you can cut a loaf of very soft bread without squishing it at all - and no crumbs either.

You cut bread with a non-serrated knife? :)

Ceramic knives have a bunch of downsides; they're even more high-maintenance than $500 custom steel knives.

Re: The Knife Maker

#183

Post by tptacek »

gchpaco wrote: post #141
tptacek wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, mass-produced chef's knives seem to be underrated; the stamped knife you can buy from Victorinox is, if you aren't way more fussy than the typical cook, likely to outperform a handcrafted aggressively-sharpened 440 high-carbon blade. Finer materials and carefully sharpened edges require a higher amount of care. There's a legitimate joy to take in using competently hand-crafted chef's knife, particularly if…

And that's actually perfectly normal even back in period when things were handmade; "gents'" tools tended to be flashy and functional but not really intended to be used , per se. Your ivory handled plow plane (think the guy in the upper right on http://antiquesandthearts.com/Antiques/AuctionWatch/2008-04-... ) was not intended to be used. I can testify from personal experience that most people using chef's knives tod…

How anybody downvotes a comment like this is beyond me. Fixed it for you though. Thanks for writing this.

Re: The Knife Maker

#184

Post by rmc »

brycecolquitt wrote: post #108
mapleoin wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So you're saying that fair trade coffee benefits "the white man" rather than the producers in the third-world country? That's exactly the opposite of what fair trade means. Also, hand-made isn't fighting against capitalism, it's fighting against mass-production, sweat-shops and machine-people jobs like the ones portrayed on Chaplin's City Lights or even Discovery Channel's How It's Made .

> Also, hand-made isn't fighting against capitalism, it's fighting against mass-production, sweat-shops and machine-people jobs like the ones portrayed on Chaplin's City Lights or even Discovery Channel's How It's Made. That's capitalism. To be more specific, those are inevitable effects of capitalism.

That's capitalism. To be more specific, those are inevitable effects of capitalism.

I'm always wary whenever anyone says "That's the effect of capitalism", since Karl Marx thought that global socialism was the inevitable effects of capitalism. So which is it? Global socialism or expoiltative labour?

Re: The Knife Maker

#185

Post by sk5t »

tptacek wrote: post #160
sk5t wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There really is a wide gulf between the best series of Wusthof, and a handmade Murray Carter (or I presume Cut Brooklyn) kitchen knife. But the latter are not for everyone... like, stop paying attention for a moment and goodbye fingertips. The best knives are so thin and sharp, that you can dice an onion without tears because you've not mushed the thing up. I have a set of good German knives too, and I reach for them…

I really don't know how much of this I believe. Maybe for sushi. But pro chefs in fine dining kitchens with zero tolerance for variation in an onion brunoise do not as a general rule use $400 custom knives. Some surely do, but they're not a job requirement. My butcher uses a "crappy" mass produced stamped knife. To a large extent I think these are fetish objects. Don't get me wrong: they are freaking cool and I want…

Pro cooks often have other concerns--an inexpensive, adequately sharp knife that one can toss into the dishwasher and sanitize might win out.

You might consider picking up something like this http://www.watanabeblade.com/english/standard/kuronakkiri.ht...; to see the difference without breaking the bank.

Re: The Knife Maker

#186

Post by CognitiveLens »

onemoreact wrote: post #180
CognitiveLens wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a source for this? I remember looking into it a while ago and the only consistent statement was that suicide rates at Foxconn were lower than those of OECD countries, not China itself. I ask because saying that the suicide rate is lower at Foxconn than in China as a whole is a much more convincing argument and I would like to be able to use it confidently in the future!

People's Republic of China suicides 13.85 per 100,000 in 2008 or 128.5 per million. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_ra... Foxconn has ~1 million workers http://www.wired.com/magazine/2011/02/ff_joelinchina/all/1 Although the company disputes some cases, evidence gathered from news reports and other sources indicates that 17 Foxconn workers have killed themselves in the past half decade. Or 1…

Thanks.

Re: The Knife Maker

#187

Post by bh42222 »

lmm wrote: post #169
bh42222 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What kind of pedantic asshole cares if the main benefit of fair trade is a sense of superiority? And it's quite something to claim the sense of smugness some people feel is a bigger deal than higher prices for farmers! Humans are instinctive, not as much as other animals, but still quite a bit. This is no way news. That we are driven by all kind of social trends, rather than pure reason is also damn old hat. I think…

If your real aim was to improve the lives of third-world farmers, you'd buy cheaper non-fair-trade coffee and donate the money saved to an organization that helped those farmers more efficiently.

Really? You think charity is better or more efficient than productive work?

Re: The Knife Maker

#188

Post by tptacek »

sk5t wrote: post #185
tptacek wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really don't know how much of this I believe. Maybe for sushi. But pro chefs in fine dining kitchens with zero tolerance for variation in an onion brunoise do not as a general rule use $400 custom knives. Some surely do, but they're not a job requirement. My butcher uses a "crappy" mass produced stamped knife. To a large extent I think these are fetish objects. Don't get me wrong: they are freaking cool and I want…

Pro cooks often have other concerns--an inexpensive, adequately sharp knife that one can toss into the dishwasher and sanitize might win out. You might consider picking up something like this http://www.watanabeblade.com/english/standard/kuronakkiri.ht... ; to see the difference without breaking the bank.

Yes, that's true, but pro chefs also have unusual requirements for precision and speed, which is basically the whole value proposition for "super sharp knife".

Home cooks don't need to be able to produce a perfect dice. Line cooks do. Line cooks don't tend to use $400 knives. That's telling.

Re: The Knife Maker

#189

Post by trafficlight »

snikolic wrote: post #2

This series really got me thinking about the programmer as a craftsman or an artist. I know pg has written about this before, but I felt the connection for the first time as I watched these videos. I really empathized with these guys: the obsession, the passion to perfect some skill, wanting to create utility for others, the risk of failing or looking crazy, the excitement of using something you've built, chasing per…

I didn't like The Distiller as compared to the Knife Maker.

The guy in the Distiller doesn't seem to have the same passion as the knife maker. I got the impression that he wanted to do something and thought he could make money as a gin distiller because they didn't exist anymore in his area.

The knife maker, on the other hand, obviously enjoys his craft. I think he will be making knives forever, even if they don't sell as well as they do now.

Re: The Knife Maker

#190

Post by webnrrd2k »

I'm a hobby blacksmith, as well as a professional programmer, and I love making physical things, too. This film strikes me in a very personal way. I see a lot of intellectual discussion on this which, while interesting, I think misses the point. This guy found a trade that he really loves, and is making sacrifices for. He's making a living, but he's certainly not getting rich off of it.

I do a lot of different things with blacksmithing, but I've been really getting into kitchen knives, as well as spoons, ladle, forks, cleavers, etc... I like combining copper work with blacksmithing.

I can't tell you how much I enjoy it. Mostly because I like making functional and unique things. There is a great sense of satisfaction that I just don't get from writing code. Also, blacksmithing uses a wonderful combination of technical ability and visual/artistic skills. Also, it's hard to find good friends and a good community that you feel comfortable in.

That film did a good job of expressing the emotional side of making stuff. It really is just a huge amount of fun. Thanks for posting that.

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