I'm not one hundred percent sure that could be right...
If you see a flash it means an action potential in a rod of cone fired. It's very hard to believe that a cosmic ray is going to, say, cause a potential difference sufficent to fire an action potential: you'd need some kind of interaction with the cells themselves opening a sodium channel or something. I guess when cells die they tend to fire off a bit, but to actually SEE a flash you'd need to have many of these things going on simultaneously.
In general, ionizing radiation is bad. But just how much more damaging are cosmic rays?
Engineering is the difficult discipline because it has to be. If anything, it expectations should be raised. Systems are becoming even more complex, foriegn students and schools are catching up to our lead (and in some circumstances, surpassing it), and in order for a young engineer to really make a dent in his profession he/she needs to understand an even larger body of knowledge than ever before.
Instead of being taught a solid background, students are taught a number of ineffective shortcuts which allow for short-term success, but leave out the greater picture of engineering practice. People are taught the practice but not the principles.
It is growing to be increasingly like this in certain areas of science as well. Even in String Theory, possibly one of the most purely theoretical subjects around, most people are working on neat little 'projects' or problems within string theory, without being exposed to the bigger picture.
Too many young physics graduates leave without complex analysis, general relativity, or a decent algorithm/programming background. Too many software engineers never achieve a decent level of programming expertise. Too many engineers can solve problem sets without striving towards truly novel inventions. Educational programs in engineering and the sciences should try to have some claim on excellence. Really.
One problem is that those who excel in engineering and the sciences typically never learned as much from a lecture environment as in working by themselves, or following a book. This is how learning happens for these people. Trying to teach them how to teach is like most students would like to be taught is, most likely, for naught: it isn't natural, it will never be natural. You might get from atrocious to passable, but never to great, and the students won't benefit that much anyway. It's probably simply better to learn to old fashioned way: cramming and working problems with your friends, while thinking and reflecting on your own.
The real problem is probably the money. It's rather disheartening to see people a fourth as smart as you work a tenth as hard and earn an MBA in a third of the time is takes you to earn a PhD while earning twice as much upon exiting. Skilled technical people are hideously undervalued in the marketplace. You can verify this by checking out opportunity costs: people who leave the engineering positions in companies tend to make more money. But this is tricky, and you might not want to bet a career on something like this.
So what do you do?
Unions don't really work anymore. Even though off-shoring, it turns out, really isn't in most company's best interests, they don't know that yet. Raises are capped. Pointy haired bosses rule the world.
Unless, of course, you make damn sure that none of them invade your workplace. Unless you make it clear that the lifeblood of the company is the product, and the product is the brainchild of the engineer. Like Google, for example...
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I'm not one hundred percent sure that could be right... If you see a flash it means an action potential in a rod of cone fired. It's very hard to believe that a cosmic ray is going to, say, cause a potential difference sufficent to fire an action potential: you'd need some kind of interaction with the cells themselves opening a sodium channel or something. I guess when cells die they tend to fire off a bit, but to actually SEE a flash you'd need to have many of these things going on simultaneously. In general, ionizing radiation is bad. But just how much more damaging are cosmic rays?
Just how dangerous are these cosmic rays anyway?
I very much disagree with the article.
Engineering is the difficult discipline because it has to be. If anything, it expectations should be raised. Systems are becoming even more complex, foriegn students and schools are catching up to our lead (and in some circumstances, surpassing it), and in order for a young engineer to really make a dent in his profession he/she needs to understand an even larger body of knowledge than ever before.
Instead of being taught a solid background, students are taught a number of ineffective shortcuts which allow for short-term success, but leave out the greater picture of engineering practice. People are taught the practice but not the principles.
It is growing to be increasingly like this in certain areas of science as well. Even in String Theory, possibly one of the most purely theoretical subjects around, most people are working on neat little 'projects' or problems within string theory, without being exposed to the bigger picture.
Too many young physics graduates leave without complex analysis, general relativity, or a decent algorithm/programming background. Too many software engineers never achieve a decent level of programming expertise. Too many engineers can solve problem sets without striving towards truly novel inventions. Educational programs in engineering and the sciences should try to have some claim on excellence. Really.
One problem is that those who excel in engineering and the sciences typically never learned as much from a lecture environment as in working by themselves, or following a book. This is how learning happens for these people. Trying to teach them how to teach is like most students would like to be taught is, most likely, for naught: it isn't natural, it will never be natural. You might get from atrocious to passable, but never to great, and the students won't benefit that much anyway. It's probably simply better to learn to old fashioned way: cramming and working problems with your friends, while thinking and reflecting on your own.
The real problem is probably the money. It's rather disheartening to see people a fourth as smart as you work a tenth as hard and earn an MBA in a third of the time is takes you to earn a PhD while earning twice as much upon exiting. Skilled technical people are hideously undervalued in the marketplace. You can verify this by checking out opportunity costs: people who leave the engineering positions in companies tend to make more money. But this is tricky, and you might not want to bet a career on something like this.
So what do you do?
Unions don't really work anymore. Even though off-shoring, it turns out, really isn't in most company's best interests, they don't know that yet. Raises are capped. Pointy haired bosses rule the world.
Unless, of course, you make damn sure that none of them invade your workplace. Unless you make it clear that the lifeblood of the company is the product, and the product is the brainchild of the engineer. Like Google, for example...