<strong>Common</strong> <strong>Sense</strong> <strong>101</strong>: <strong>Engineering</strong> There’s empty space below. Use it to jot down a few notes, or doodle, or whatever. Page 4
T 2. Oh, the Humanity! here’s a discipline called “ergonomics”, but it’s more correctly called “human factors engineering”. What is meant by this is, that engineers should take into account the humans who ultimately use whatever it is they make. Human factors engineering, however, is multidisciplinary. Engineers are, in general, incapable of doing a good job of it by themselves. To do it properly requires input from psychologists, statisticians, anthropometrists (those who measure human bodies), industrial designers, and operations researchers, in addition to engineers. And most importantly, it needs input from the consumers—those who actually use the products engineers design and make. So it needs common sense. You know why the Three Mile Island meltdown happened? Shortfalls in human factors engineering, a.k.a. common sense. There were so many indicators and dials on the wall of the control room of the nuclear reactor that the operators couldn’t keep track of them all. Besides, the indicators didn’t always mean what the operators thought they meant. Despite a crucial valve being stuck open, they assumed that a light on the control panel indicated that the valve was closed. The light did not in actual fact indicate the position of the valve, but rather the status of the solenoid upon which the valve depended for opening and closing; but there was nothing to inform the operators of that fact. And another indicator, which could have told them that the valve was actually stuck open, was located out of sight of the operators. On top of that, even if it had been visible to them it wouldn’t have done any good, because this particular set of operators had not even been trained to use it. The problem was not diagnosed for hours. In fact, it was only when the shift changed and a fresh set of operators came into the control room—operators who did not share the confusion of the first set—that the problem got diagnosed at all. There’s a word for all this: “Confusionism”. (Again, just kidding. Or maybe not. Maybe there should be a word for this sort of cockup, given how serious its consequences can be.) It was the interface between the reactor and its operators that was at fault: had the interface been properly thought out, the meltdown would never have happened. Just goes to show how important human factors engineering is. The problem, though, is that even today, over thirty years after Three Mile Island, neither engineers nor their overseers—namely, managers and COOs and CEOs—take it seriously enough. Most things, even in this day and age, are created without any input from psychologists, statisticians, anthropometrists, industrial designers, or operations researchers. Maybe in the manufacture of simple things like tables and chairs it doesn’t matter too much, but with complicated, big ticket items, it sure does. Actually, it matters with simple items too. Take post boxes, for instance—the kind you put your letters into for mailing. Here in Canada, at least, they are mostly located at street corners. The idea is, I suppose, that people will walk to the corner of their street to post their letters. Maybe that used to happen in the past. But in this day and age, hardly anyone walks—people drive everywhere. (That this is not a good thing, health-wise, is beside the point: the fact is that most people simply don’t walk when doing their errands. They’ll gladly go out jogging another time with their iPod, but not when doing their errands.) But at most street corners there’s never any place to park, or even to stop the car! So how is one supposed to get out and post a letter? Many people carry around unposted letters in their cars for days on end until they find a post box near some parking spot—I know I do. This is utterly ludicrulous. What’d be the difficulty in locating post boxes in parking lots, where people actually park? Better still, why not locate them at entrances to offices, grocery stores and shopping areas? If people are going somewhere, they won’t be going merely to post a letter, will they: they’ll be doing something more serious, and posting a letter will be just a side issue. Mind you, post boxes could be improved still further, by, like, incorporating stamp-vending machines in them, and maybe even a scale to weigh your letter or parcel to tell you how much postage is needed; and that sort of improvement would also fall in the domain of human factors engineering. The American military takes human factors engineering so seriously, in fact, that, to quote the current (<strong>December</strong> 2011) Wikipedia entry on Human Factors, “U.S. Department of Defense regulations require a comprehensive management and technical strategy for human systems integration (HSI) be initiated early in the acquisition process to ensure that human performance is considered throughout the system design Page 5
- Page 1: Common Sense 101: Engineering Laser
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- Page 7 and 8: T Dedication his book is dedicated
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- Page 11 and 12: I Introduction am not an engineer.
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- Page 47 and 48: I 16. Something Old, Something New
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- Page 57 and 58: I 21. Deliver Us t bears repeating,
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E 27. Cool it, Man! verything shoul
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O 28. The Dark Side ne of the worst
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W 29. Finders Keepers, Losers Weepe
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J 30. It’s a Steal ust about ever
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O 31. Check this out! nce upon a ti
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Y 32. Autopilot ou know that airlin
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W 33. It’s Standard hen you go to
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W 35. The Rotary Club e often derid
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C 36. Friction ontrary to what most
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O 37. Wireless f course we all get
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W 39. Ouch! hat’s up with manufac
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T 40. Square Peg in Round Hole here
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D 41. Paint Job id you know that a
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W 42. Break Down hy do so many thin
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O 43. Deterioration ne of the worst
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T 44. Corrosion here are corrosive
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O 45. Rock and Roll ne of the worst
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T 46. R.T.F.M. hat stands, as you s
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W 47. Pinch Me hen I was a very you
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I 48. Shocking am a fairly good han
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R 49. Leaks emember the Exxon Valde
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B 50. The Future is Where You’ll
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The Future is Where You’ll be Spe
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T About the Author he author is a n