General Discussion 8

[lunchmeat]

On the night of May 16th and 17th, 1943, 617 Squadron, RAF, engaged in Operation Chastise, the attack on hydroelectric dams supplying Germany's Ruhr Valley war production. Breaching two dams and damaging a third with the "bouncing mine" developed by Barnes Wallis, required precision, low level flying and resulted in the highest percentage of losses incurred by Allied air forces in the war, during combat operations. The squadron still exists, flying Tornadoes these days and incorporates the title Dambusters in their squadron insignia.

Low altitude flying, over water, is difficult, even with odern radar altimeters and terraine avoidance software. Performing the task at night, using only the synchronized beams of spotlights, is a demonstration of extreme airmanship.

In other areas of aviation history and service fidelity: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/sc...pagewanted=all


Somewhat different approach to "What possible difference could it make, now", is it not?

[jeriddian]

On the night of May 16th and 17th, 1943, 617 Squadron, RAF, engaged in Operation Chastise, the attack on hydroelectric dams supplying Germany's Ruhr Valley war production. Breaching two dams and damaging a third with the "bouncing mine" developed by Barnes Wallis, required precision, low level flying and resulted in the highest percentage of losses incurred by Allied air forces in the war, during combat operations. The squadron still exists, flying Tornadoes these days and incorporates the title Dambusters in their squadron insignia.

Low altitude flying, over water, is difficult, even with odern radar altimeters and terraine avoidance software. Performing the task at night, using only the synchronized beams of spotlights, is a demonstration of extreme airmanship.

In other areas of aviation history and service fidelity: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/21/sc...pagewanted=all


Somewhat different approach to "What possible difference could it make, now", is it not?

They made a movie of that name "Dambusters" about the entire operations also.

[hrodwulf123]

Have you ever noticed that when not wearing any makeup Lady Gaga looks a lot like young Sissy Spacek (Carrie):

Lady Gaga

Sissy Spacek

[TransWarpDrive]

Have you ever noticed that when not wearing any makeup Lady Gaga looks a lot like young Sissy Spacek (Carrie):

Lady Gaga

Sissy Spacek

Interesting observation - Lady Gaga does resemble Ms. Spacek in her younger days! This is the first time I've seen LG without makeup, and I must admit she looks pretty good. Makes me wonder why she'd want to hide that natural beauty from the world the way she does...

[campy]

One hundred years ago tonight: Parisian ballet fans riot at the premier of Igor Stravinsky's Le Sacre du printemps.

[hrodwulf123]

If someone from 1950s suddenly appeared in today's world, what would be the most difficult thing to explain to them?

[jeriddian]

The apparent complete breakdown (to them) of American society

[TransWarpDrive]

The apparent complete breakdown (to them) of American society

Yeah; I guess the changes in society over the last 60+ years would appear to them like a complete breakdown....

All of a sudden, I'm reminded of a scene from the first Back to the Future movie:

Doc Brown: So tell me, Future Boy, who's President of the United States in 1985?
Marty: Ronald Reagan!
Doc: Ronald Reagan!? The Actor??

[hrodwulf123]

Okay, but how would you explain today's technology?
Let me give you an example of what they thought the 21st century would be like:
in the 1957 they buried a Plymouth Belvedere (it's a car that's called Miss Belvedere) in an concrete time-capsule which was opened in 2007. There was a large can of gasoline and instructions on how to drive that car in it's trunk, because they thought that people in the 21st century wouldn't know how to drive a car (they probably imagined that we'll have something similar to those flying cars from Jetsons).

[lunchmeat]

Okay, but how would you explain today's technology?
Let me give you an example of what they thought the 21st century would be like:
in the 1957 they buried a Plymouth Belvedere (it's a car that's called Miss Belvedere) in an concrete time-capsule which was opened in 2007. There was a large can of gasoline and instructions on how to drive that car in it's trunk, because they thought that people in the 21st century wouldn't know how to drive a car (they probably imagined that we'll have something similar to those flying cars from Jetsons).

After 50 years, I would imagine that the gasoline would be either mostly varnish or bacterial growth in it would have eaten through the can (Jurassic Park movies and the survival of electronics and food in vending machines after years unattended in the jungle is a similar but lengthy discussion). However the thought process is interesting, given that, even now, people still sail, row, ride horses and bicycles, fly in hot air balloons and walk, none of which are exactly cutting edge technologies now or in the 1950s. It's funny though, I attended the New York World's Fair in the 1960s. According to the exhibits we were supposed to have the Willie Ley torroid space stations, lunar colonies, undersea cities, flying cars and atomic powered ground cars a couple of decades ago. Actually I would love to see California's reaction to a nuclear powered automobile. The future never seems to turn out quite the way anyone thinks it will, kind of like those science fiction stories where the Soviet Union is still a big noise 100 years from now. In the same general vein, I'm reminded of two science fiction stories I read. One, whose title eludes me, was about a society where everyone teleported from place to place, kind of like having star gates everywhere. The protagonist, for reasons I don't recall, used a normal exit door and went outside, discovering he had the whole outdoors to himself (landscaping was maintained by robots, an advance I heartily approve of after observing my own unkempt yard), so he took to walking everywhere. Most people he knew thought him pretty weird, but he introduced a circle of friends to going outside and it turned into something of a movement.
The other story is called The Specter General and is about, on the one hand, a decaying interstellar empire which is forgetting how to maintain the technology that they inherited from earlier empires. One of their naval forces encounters a bunch of Marines from a couple of empires back, who have been stranded on a planet for hundreds of years after their fleet was destroyed before it came back to pick them up. A repair depot unit, they've divided their time between training the subsequent generations in maintenance and repair and subsistence. The culture clash is pretty entertaining and it all works out in the end, the empire has somebody who knows how to fix their stuff and the Marines finally have something to work on. The title, by the way, is a reference to how the officers, over the generations, have kept their people focused. Every year one of them dons a suit of powered armor and appears, seemingly from a ship in orbit, as a general inspecting the base and the troops.