I'm live blogging a meeting at the New America Foundation meeting on the topic of the new social contract.
CSPAN broadcasting.
Room not really set up for blogging. SFF did much better last July.
Room is packed. Few empty seats.
New era of American politics? Post partisan? Progressive? Comeback conservatism?
Post partisan -- advocated for deficit reduction. Normal partisanship unable to cope with long standing problems. JFK Jr. -- George reference.
Now Schwartzenegger, Bloomberg. Republicans and Democrats working together to bring forth new ideas.
Americans becoming more partisan, not less, according to polls. Partisanship rising among youth as well. Millenials have been formed by exposure to out of control individuals. Parents have emphasized cooperation, prosocial behavior. Open minded, keep focused on big picture. New generation looks for respect, comity, etc.
Rutgers prof Cliff? up. Middle aged, grey beard (literally). Political culture and issues of day quite different.
Issues will be played out in political culture. Core values will underlie.
Core values:
1. Society favors equal opportunity to succeed. Committed to altruism, also self reliance, entrepreneurism, etc.
2. Commitment to public sector, also wary of it. Ambivalence about major institutions.
3. Americans have firm belief in God. 80% see themselves as believers. Religious beliefs shape our politics.
4. We believe we should have aggressive place in world. Opening for space: Charles Elachi.
5. Social security and retirement income. People no longer believe it will be there for them. No trust in government retirement plans.
6. People believe they are overtaxed. Think taxes are unfair, complicated. Replacement could be worse.
7. Health care an important issue. People concerned about cost.
8. Job satisfaction OK. (Didn't ask me.)
9. Environment a second tier issue. Finance and economics can affect.
Good for next social contract. Crisis will produce change. People tired of Bush, war in Iraq. Concern about economy has hit major proportions.
Public ready to put 9/11 behind us.
Cliff stops. Liked working with NAF very much.
Younger people less likely to be interested in politics. More leisure oriented, more entrepreneurial, more cooperative.
Interesting thought -- what about cooperation among individuals? Out of control individuals more a symptom of failed authoritarianism than democratic societies.
Millenials have sense of us, not of they.
11:45.
Mark? Panel of people from whom I have learned the most about Congress. Singularity point in American politics. Does he know of techie "Singularity?"
I'm wearing a suit. Lots of people more casually dressed. Lots of young people. Fair number of middle aged folk. They tend to be more business dress.
Mark thinks we can't go back to governing like we did in 1980s and 1990s. 1994 wiped out Southern Democrats. 2006 wiped out northern Republicans. Democratic Party now the liberal party with base in north and west. Republican party now conservative party with base in south.
Question is now how do we govern the country. Reading liberal encomiums to Buckley. We need a liberalism that can engage with conservativism. Obama has this approach. Mentioned Dionne. Laugher: Dionne once used TSA as an example supporting "sensible" gun control.
K Street project of conservatives. Courts have been shifted. Conservatives have had some policy victories.
Democrats still in Bill Clinton era -- big government is over.
Susan: Republicans have created new agency, Federal intrusion into education, new benefits. Can't happen now -- majority is too thin. Personalities, e.g., Delay, Rove also played role. Shift to Senate led to House style being tried in Senate. Electorate taking control back. McCain would not have been pick of Republican leadership. Hillary according to theory should have been shoe in. People tired of partisanship. Much larger turnout inn 2008.
Susan says demographics driving elections. Hmm. Why do people from NYC move to Nevada?
12:15. Battery at 57% -- 1hr, 45min left.
Powerful communication tools at service of politically active.
12:30. Panel scheduled to start at 12:15.
Savings have been eroded. Housing a problem.
Tax benefits will flow to people with higher incomes, more wealth. Need an inclusive savings policy. Must be life long. Left focuses on opportunity, right on ownership. Universal 401k, savings plans that start at birth.
David Gray -- work and family issues. Under the radar issues: foster care, child care. Work family imbalance. Stress, two earner couples. 81% want better work life balance. People feel stressed at work. Democrats all had work life proposals. Tight labor markets leading business to accommodate desires, needs. States taking a lead. War forcing administration to take a look at work life balance. Lots of stress on family life for military. Back to 18th century? Baby boom retiring. Want to work flexibly. Older people want flexibility in work place. Fiscal crisis will also push flexibility.
Maya: budget issues. Need to update and raise revenues. We need fundamental tax reform. Percent of total economy an important line for many people.
Only a few of us live blogging. Some people taking written notes.
Now switching to dead tree note taking. Keeping the laptop on my lap is not that comfortable.
Here are my dead tree notes:
Len Nichols: Why now? Why optimistic? Cost of doing nothing is very high.
China, India make it impossible to increase prices. (What will happen if China collapses?)
Reality: Need 70 votes in Senate for a proposal to get the 60 you need. (Mikulski does bipartisanship well on aerospace issues.)
Need to buy smarter. (We need discussion of what is possible and what is not.)
Incentives are for much health care.
Political parties.
David Frum: Coalition of 70s and 80s declining. Republicans not doing as well. Movement to Democratic Party real and strong.
Bush aimed at reassembling Republican coalition.
9/11 elevated nationalism.
Lack of success in Iraq has been painful.
Collapse in Republican identification among young.
Open door at end: party shift, not political shift.
Typical voter quote: "If Eisenhower were alive, I'd vote for him." (Susan Eisenhower has endorsed Obama. She's also married to Roald Sagdeyev -- one time head of Soviet civil space program.)
Johnathan Chait: Issues moving to left. People in antigovernment mood. Democrats are shills for home state industry. Left creating an institutions on left to counterbalance ones on right.
I left at 1:47.
Friday, February 29, 2008
Monday, February 25, 2008
Aerospace Workforce Issues
In September 2007 Claudia Morrell, Executive Director of the Center for Women and Information Technology of the University of Maryland Baltimore County gave a talk to the committee leading the Aerospace Initiative of the Governor's Workforce Investment Board in the State of Maryland. During her talk she emphasized three reasons why young women were not pursuing careers in technology:
- They disliked the work-life balance common in technology fields.
- They thought the work was boring.
- They were familiar with managers in their 30s and 40s who were extraordinarily poor leaders who not only did harm to their groups but also to the careers and lives of young people coming into their fields.
She noted that when these issues were successfully addressed, that young women – as well as young men – were far more likely to choose work in technology.
These findings echo what I have heard in other forums as well. In July at a NewSpace meeting organized by Space Frontier Foundation Loretta Whitesides commented how the generation born after Apollo did not share the memories of older people involved in aerospace. NASA Administrator Michael Griffin might vividly remember John Glenn's orbital flight. Some one born after the last Apollo mission in 1972 will remember the Challenger tragedy instead. She also commented that they were looking for leadership that listened and was open to new ideas. The fact that NASA does not have that reputation any more is a major criticism.
Mary Lynne Dittmar has done extensive research in how the public thinks about NASA. She has delivered papers at conferences such as Space 2006, organized by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, and written articles such as Sustaining exploration: communications, relevance, and value (Part 1) and Part 2. In her work she has expressed the view that NASA needs to start listening to people and develop a bottom up as well as a top down method of generating value. Dittmar has noted that younger people are not much interested in sending humans to Mars – one goal of the current Vision for Space Exploration. She does note, though, that young people are much more interested and supportive of things like space tourism – which offers the possibility of real participation – and probes to places such as Mars – which again offers some possibility of participation, if only vicariously.
We also have the findings of the Columbia Accident Investigation Board. Among other things, they described NASA as an organization that failed to listen to issues raised by staff more familiar with matters at hand than managers above them. They also described NASA as not a learning organization. This should be viewed as damning criticism of a research and development organization.
We thus see some common threads developing with regard to the aerospace industry. There is a lack of listening, a lack of willingness to try ideas that are developed outside an insiders' club (the “Not Invented Here” syndrome) and problems learning things outside relatively narrow specialties. While this leads to high profile failures in the case of NASA, one can see similar things throughout technological fields. There is also the notion that the culture of aerospace – and indeed much of technological work – needs reform. One interesting observation is made by tech workers in all sorts of fields. We claim that the comic strip Dilbert by Scott Adams is not a comic strip, but a documentary. Adams himself is a former IT professional. Tech workers supply him with many ideas.
There are, however, good examples we can learn from. The SAS Institute has an excellent reputation for the quality of its products as well as the way it treats its employees and the way it operates in the larger community. SAS seems like one company that has learned that “It Takes a Village” to not only bring up healthy citizens but to do all sorts of things – including run a successful business that makes significant contributions to the larger society for over thirty years. In the past few years NASA Ames, under Pete Worden, also seems like a place that is open to the outside and new ideas. They are also doing some pretty interesting things technically. There are also other examples of quality leadership in aerospace. Friends who have worked for Nobel Prize Winner John Mather at Goddard Space Flight Center say all sorts of good things about the man. He is described as a man who listens, who gives credit to others and is, to quote one man, “a real Boy Scout.”
In this short paper I have begun to describe workforce problems in aerospace and, indeed, in much of technological work. What are some solutions that a Clinton administration could pursue to help address these very real problems?
One idea could be fairly simple to implement. There is an office of the ombudsman. It seems to me – someone who worked at Goddard Space Flight Center for 9 years – that this office is fairly low profile. Raising the profile – and extending its mission to include contractors seems to me to be a good idea. Allowing anyone – regardless of employment status – to anonymously bring issues to the attention of this office, especially management issues, would help address problems that I have identified. There are some dirty little secrets that need addressing. People – especially contractor employees – have quit because of “lies and abuse.” Some groups withhold the granting of civil servant status to more independent employees.
A second idea is to begin sending employees – both civil servant and contractor – off for training in people knowledge. At Space 2006 I met a woman involved with an aerospace MBA program at the University of Tennessee. Since she was one of the few people I have ever met with a background in both the “hard” and social sciences, I asked her why so many MBAs had such poor knowledge of how humans behaved. She replied that, while an MBA student could get a solid knowledge of such things, too many avoided such areas. This needs to be changed. When NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, who holds, among other things an MBA degree, can get up in public and, while discussing the Columbia report, say that he doesn't understand cultural issues because of a lack of knowledge of human psychology, that is an admission of inadequacy that needs rectifying.
A third idea is to bring such training to all employees in aerospace. This would mean not just an occasional lecture at a NASA center or contractor facility but serious education programs along the lines that, for example, engineers receive as part of their careers.
A fourth idea is to identify those employees who have already gained experience in some field outside their technical specialty. While at Goddard I participated as a photographer and occasional actor in Goddard's Music and Drama Club. Members of this club – who put on major shows more than once a year – had social skills and knowledge significantly superior to most employees. There are many other ways of identifying employees with broader knowledge.
NASA in this way could become a model for society to emulate. Many scientists decry the lack of knowledge of science by our political leaders. Much less often some scientists observe that scientists lack knowledge of the political sector – and, indeed, almost anything outside their narrow specialty. This needs to change.
This brief paper is meant to spark discussion about an important but not high profile challenge facing our society. I think the challenge can be met with thoughtful, open minded leadership.
Thursday, February 21, 2008
A New, Improved Carl Sagan
I first started paying close attention to Nobel Prize Winner in Physics John Mather after a lecture at the Goddard Memorial Symposium last year. He's a fine public speaker -- especially for a physicist. He also seemed like a friendly guy -- at least on the podium. During his talk he displayed at one point photos of members of his team. I recognized one, Steve Leete, from my time at Goddard. I asked Steve what kind of guy Mather was -- besides being a brilliant physicist. He told me he was a really nice guy who listened to people, freely gave credit where it was due to team members and was a "real Boy Scout."
Many people note several problems with academia today. Undergraduate students are almost an afterthought. Graduate students are all too often treated as close to slave labor. Teaching is held in low regard. Listening to students -- essential for really good teaching -- is all too often neglected. And we wonder why students depart from such difficult fields as physics for more remunerative career paths.
But there are alternative models that seem to work. And John Mather seems to have first benefited from them and could now pass on the things he has learned. Here's a bit of John's biography, along with some comments of my own.
John grew up in a small town in then (possibly still) rural north New Jersey. Newton High School which he attended still has only 901 students according to Wikipedia. Hmm. Many observers now think that the smaller high school does a much better job of listening to students. Administrators and other school leaders get to know their students better. Teachers spend more time teaching and less administering. They also interact with other teachers who are considerably different from themselves. They're more likely to find out what Sally and John are doing in other classes and activities. It's also easier for parents -- especially intelligent parents -- to interact with the school. The school is nearby. The school's staff are people who are part of the larger community.
After high school, John did not attend a large research university. He went to the private Swarthmore College, current student population 1,500. Small schools like Swarthmore and Vassar College where I spent a year emphasize undergraduate education. While research is done by faculty, teaching is given highest priority. People who attend such schools pick up better listening and communication skills. The comments I made about John's high school apply just as well to places like Swarthmore.
By the time John hit the major research establishments of U.C. Berkeley and Columbia University, his character had been formed in major ways. He had picked up skills that students who attended large institutions have much more difficulty learning. Also, by reaching Berkeley when he did, he escaped to some extent the problems that have come to engulf contemporary academia. Weren't there protests at Berkeley in the late 60s? There certainly were. While lots of people blame the students for not respecting authority, some of us note that faculty respect for students had begun to drop earlier -- possibly as a result of the schools becoming too big with too high a focus on research and too little on teaching.
Perhaps it is time for John Mather to become the new Carl Sagan. There's one advantage John might have right off the bat. It would be very hard for people to say he wasn't a real scientist. Since he listens to people, it might be possible for him to use his own life story to instruct others in ways that he developed.
Many people note several problems with academia today. Undergraduate students are almost an afterthought. Graduate students are all too often treated as close to slave labor. Teaching is held in low regard. Listening to students -- essential for really good teaching -- is all too often neglected. And we wonder why students depart from such difficult fields as physics for more remunerative career paths.
But there are alternative models that seem to work. And John Mather seems to have first benefited from them and could now pass on the things he has learned. Here's a bit of John's biography, along with some comments of my own.
John grew up in a small town in then (possibly still) rural north New Jersey. Newton High School which he attended still has only 901 students according to Wikipedia. Hmm. Many observers now think that the smaller high school does a much better job of listening to students. Administrators and other school leaders get to know their students better. Teachers spend more time teaching and less administering. They also interact with other teachers who are considerably different from themselves. They're more likely to find out what Sally and John are doing in other classes and activities. It's also easier for parents -- especially intelligent parents -- to interact with the school. The school is nearby. The school's staff are people who are part of the larger community.
After high school, John did not attend a large research university. He went to the private Swarthmore College, current student population 1,500. Small schools like Swarthmore and Vassar College where I spent a year emphasize undergraduate education. While research is done by faculty, teaching is given highest priority. People who attend such schools pick up better listening and communication skills. The comments I made about John's high school apply just as well to places like Swarthmore.
By the time John hit the major research establishments of U.C. Berkeley and Columbia University, his character had been formed in major ways. He had picked up skills that students who attended large institutions have much more difficulty learning. Also, by reaching Berkeley when he did, he escaped to some extent the problems that have come to engulf contemporary academia. Weren't there protests at Berkeley in the late 60s? There certainly were. While lots of people blame the students for not respecting authority, some of us note that faculty respect for students had begun to drop earlier -- possibly as a result of the schools becoming too big with too high a focus on research and too little on teaching.
Perhaps it is time for John Mather to become the new Carl Sagan. There's one advantage John might have right off the bat. It would be very hard for people to say he wasn't a real scientist. Since he listens to people, it might be possible for him to use his own life story to instruct others in ways that he developed.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
A Few Unorthodox Thoughts About Al Gore and "An Inconvenient Truth"
I began this blog posting as an e-mail sent off to a group of St. Mark's Episcopal Church people after seeing the film "An Inconvenient Truth" at St. Mark's in October of 2006. Lots of you know I'm a bit better informed that the average St. Mark's member on issues relating to science and technology. Some of you might know I tend to be in favor of work to solve, or at least mitigate, environmental problems.
Two days after seeing "An Inconvenient Truth" I must say my view of the film is more negative than positive. This kind of film might be what is needed to get people to wake up and take action. Still, though, I find
a number of things disturbing. Here are a few of my reactions:
- Gore repeatedly made use of the words "moral imperative."
Believe it or not, that kind of thing resonates negatively with
me. To me, the phrase also says "Shut up and stop thinking.
Here's the problem and what must be done." I'd be much more
impressed if Gore had said "We have a problem. Let's see what
we can do to fix it." That invites participation by all kinds
of people. It's less judgmental. It's more open and creative.
- Gore repeatedly referred to "so called skeptics." I'm very
active in tech circles. Referring to opponents and critics as
"so called skeptics" is insulting and derogatory. I know some
people who fit into that category. Believe it or not, the ones
I know (some reasonably prominent) are not pawns of the oil
companies. Some of them have been badly burned by certain
elements of the environmental movement that are perceived, with
some justification, as pushing environmental concerns as a way
of getting various kinds of power.
- Gore said the debate is over. That's not true. Yes, the great
majority of people who study the atmosphere are in agreement
that we are experiencing global warming. There is even a
reasonable amount of agreement that humans are becoming an
increasingly big contributor to warming. Where the debate
starts occurring is about how much warming there will be and
what impact it will have on the planet. Personally, I tend to
favor erring on the side that we should take stronger measures
to reduce global warming, but I do know people I respect and
trust who worry that antiwarming measures will do more harm than
good.
- Another topic of debate is what to do to reduce human
contributions toward global warming. I -- and quite a few
others -- favor moving toward nuclear and solar power. Both are
environmentally friendlier than carbon based fuels. Thoughtful
conservation can also play a role.
- There's a word that keeps popping up with regard to carbon based
fuels, especially coal. The word is "sequester." I think using
that word tends toward the dishonest. In our society the only
other time I've heard that word is with respect to jury trials.
We sequester a jury for a short time to advance the cause of a
fair trial. Such action has little impact on the jurors' lives
and even less on society as a whole -- except, of course, in
promoting fairer, more honest justice. We will not be
"sequestering" carbon dioxide. We will be arranging for the
very long term storage of large amounts of a harmful chemical
compound. It won't be simple or easy. Last week in the Post I
read an article about the subject of global warming and
business. In the article they referred to a pilot project to
store carbon dioxide by pumping it into the ground next to the
plant. If we're talking pilot projects, we're saying that a
solid solution is a ways off. Nuclear and solar are already
here. France, I believe, gets 70% of its electrical power from
nuclear. That's a working reality, not a pilot project. What
about nuclear waste? There's data that suggests that isn't
quite a big a problem as some people claim. There are multiple
proposals out there. One, storing waste at Yucca Mountain,
would be much closer to reality if it weren't for political
controversy.
- Gore at one point noted that Chinese cars get twice the gas
mileage as American ones. I'd like to see an in depth look at
why that is. Gore didn't say anything about the "why." Some
people -- even at St. Mark's -- have complained that big trucks
are more common these days because of demands to carry more and
more stuff. When I was a child, I rode in cars without even a
seat belt. Now we demand that children be carried around in car
seats to protect them. We also spend much more time
transporting children to various activities. Perhaps the
Chinese aren't doing such things. I don't know. But I do think
we should look carefully at the two societies instead of making
comparisons with the goal of making Americans feel guilty.
These, believe it or not, are just a few quick reactions. Let me repeat
I think we should take measures to address this problem. But it's quite
important that the actions be well researched and thought out. I
personally think "An Inconvenient Truth" is at least as much a call for
learning and dialog as it is for action.
Since writing this e-mail I have had some other thoughts. Al Gore keeps using the word "moral" to describe the kinds of actions he favors. That might sit well with deeply religious Southern Baptists, but it has some pretty negative connotations for a significant portion of the population. This is especially true when he applies that label to his own actions and of people like himself. Global warming is most definitely, at least in part, an engineering challenge. What if engineers come up with solutions that allow us to live better lives while taking better care of the planet? What if some solutions have unacceptable consequences? We could really reduce the human race's impact on the planet by reducing our numbers to, say, 1 billion or even 100 million. I will leave it as an exercise for the reader to contemplate how that could be immoral.
Comparing the United States unfavorably to China looks even worse today than it did a year ago. If Gore had compared us to Britain, France, Germany, Canada or some other free, advanced Western nation, he would have earned far more respect from me. But China? This week the Washington Post has had both an editorial and article on China's severe environmental problems. The Economist also has an interesting leader China, Beware that doesn't exactly portray the country as one we should emulate. Articles and editorials such as these give me -- and most reasonable people -- the idea that China is not worth emulating.
Just what is Al Gore thinking?
Wednesday, September 26, 2007
A Few Words From Cyberspace Citizen Chuck Divine
OK, sonny, pour yourself and your great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather Chuck a double of The Glenlivet, sit down and listen to his tales of life as a cybercitizen. Remember, you need some good alcohol to cope when newbies like young Dickie McCormick -- you know, the President of Rutgers -- come barging in without learning how cyberspace operates.
I became a cybercitizen in 1986. At the time I was on the Board (or is that Bored?) of Directors of the L5 Society. Don't know what the L5 Society was? Google it, sonny. Let's just say I was bright enough to understand the technology of orbital space colonies, bright enough to communicate the benefits of same to normal people, bright enough to lead the organization of various events and groups and dumb enough to actually think that by herding tribbles I could help get us into said space colonies in 15 years. What are tribbles? Try Google or Wikipedia, sonny.
Anyway, David Brandt-Erichsen sent out a letter to all board members telling us about a thing called the Byte Information Exchange (BIX for short). Noted SF author Jerry Pournelle had set up a conference on BIX for L5 board members. I used my brand new computer -- an AT&T PC with TWO floppy drives and 256K of memory -- to access BIX via a 1200 baud modem that was the envy of my friends who only had 300 baud modems. Since Jerry was jerryp on BIX, I picked the BIX name chuckd. It was much later that I learned there was a rapper by the name of Chuck D. C'est la vie....
Anyway, BIX was a wonderful place to discuss space politics, space technology, information technology and lots more. When I posted an essay that I wrote that had appeared in the meatspace Trenton Times, my reputation as a thoughtful writer was sealed. OK, some of the people doing the judging were a bit out there. Still, though, my stock rose enormously in cyberspace.
While on BIX, we heard stories of the fabled Internet and Usenet. Back in the 1980s they were operated by the GOVERNMENT. The discussions had to be better and more informed. Well, by the early 90s I was working at Goddard Space Flight Center (another source of funny stories, if you find making fun of the mentally ill funny) and I actually got access to the Internet and Usenet. I decided, just for practice, to take a look at rec.arts.sf.tv. Imagine my surprise when I found ignorant university undergraduates praising the 1970s version of Battlestar (or was it Cattle Car?) Galactica. That show was mediocre at best.
OK, by then I had two identities in cyberspace. There was still chuckd on BIX. There was also xrcjd at Goddard. I got my first spam as xrcjd@dirac.gsfc.gov! I still remember the spams advertising millions and millions of e-mail addresses. The advertisers, though, thoughtfully removed all .edu, .mil and .gov addresses. Hmm, I thought, they weren't using their own product. Once an idiotic, sexually frigid manager accused me of using gummint computers to look at porn based on one such piece of spam. Ah, those were the days.
It was at Goddard in 1995 that I created my first website. It was to support the work of the group of which I was a part. Yes, sonny, I can write HTML at the bare metal level. Woohoo!
Later on I finally bought a more up to date PC for my home. The 1986 machine finally burned out. The new computer became my first Linux box. The machine came with no software. When I checked out the prices of software at a local store, I freaked out. A friend at Goddard, Meg Larko, acquainted me with Linux. It was FREE! And actually pretty good. OK, normal people, like newbie Dickie McCormick, couldn't have used it. But it worked pretty well for an experienced cyberspace citizen like me.
Anyway, I signed up first for Earthlink. I became chuckdivine@earthlink.net. Then a friend told me Earthlink was run by Scientologists. Bye bye, Earthlink, hello att.net. I became chuck.divine@worldnet.att.net. I also upgraded to a 56K modem. Boy, was that fast! I could really zip around the Internet at warp speed now! I could read and post on Slashdot -- with nearly 4 million readers. On Slashdot my identity was ChuckDivine. My karma is still excellent. My posts, especially about space exploration, garnered +5 ratings -- the highest possible. Only Cthulthu knows how many people read that crap. And, as you know, Cthulthu won't tell unless you give him a really big bribe. I don't post nearly as much there as I once did, but I do try to look at Slashdot at least once a week. This week I checked out the comments about the awful TV show "The Big Bang Theory." Slashdotters didn't like it either.
Then I got involved in AIAA. My involvement in the Baltimore Section got me to upgrade to a broadband account with Comcast. Today I'm chuck.divine@comcast.net. I even have my own set of websites -- yes, sonny, websites -- on Comcast. My home page has links to most of them. Be careful, though. A couple of pages are NSFW. Oh, the character Ambassador Chuck is totally fictional. I was really stunned when some 419 actually replied to the good ambassador.
After some years of posting on various blogs like Rand Simberg's and even getting an occasional e-mail posted by Jerry Pournelle, I decided to start this blog myself. I haven't made too many waves yet, but time will tell.
I've heard of things like Facebook and Myspace, but, truthfully, they're a bit simple minded for long time cybercitizens like me. They're fine for newbies, though. Perhaps Dickie McCormick should surf on over and give them a try. I'd be glad to make comments when he does.
------------End of colloquial mode------------------------
OK, all, now I'm going to assume a more serious demeanor. I've been writing like this to give people who aren't as familiar with cyberspace a bit of a look at what the wild, wild Internet is really like. Yes, there are very corporate websites that present established organizations quite well. People do go to them to get honest information about what such organizations are intentionally doing. Rutgers has a pretty good set of websites.
When the new alumni plan, though, talks about connecting with the community via blast e-mails from President McCormick (whom I do highly respect), I wonder what they are thinking. If it's some vitally important piece of information of importance to the entire Rutgers community, that might be the way to go. But that kind of communication doesn't really connect people -- especially alumni -- to Rutgers. What might be a better approach would be to establish web fora much like Slashdot where old friends could reconnect, where former students could connect with faculty, where alumni in various geographic localities could start clubs to connect local grads together, where alumni in various subgroups could connect with each other and where ways of helping alumni from various subgroups connect with people outside their groups. That's a more organic, democratic approach which might strengthen bonds among Rutgers grads and the university.
The new plan also talks about things like a more meaningful Homecoming. Have people thought that through? I attended my first Rutgers football game not as a college student but as a guest of my father, class of 1935. My mom came along. I was just a child. When the original Rutgers Stadium was built, it could accommodate over 20,000 people. Back in 1938 when it opened, that number was a quite sizable part of the entire Rutgers family -- students, faculty, alumni and family members. Today the much larger stadium can accommodate only 40K+ people. The larger Rutgers family easily tops 1 million. What do people have in mind?
I'd be more impressed if, in this past year, the committee that produced the report had spent time contacting alumni and listening to them. I'm webmaster of the Rutgers Club of DC and just took on that role for the class of 1967. I get e-mails from alumni relations and the local clubs as well as some from clubs around the country. Before writing this piece, I searched through my old e-mails over the past year. I didn't find anything about the work of this committee.
Old alums like myself clearly aren't the entire Rutgers community. But just what did this committee do? It's not like some of us are hard to find.
A few token meetings now that the report has come out are not going to help all that much.
What thoughts do you have? Feel free to post comments here.
I became a cybercitizen in 1986. At the time I was on the Board (or is that Bored?) of Directors of the L5 Society. Don't know what the L5 Society was? Google it, sonny. Let's just say I was bright enough to understand the technology of orbital space colonies, bright enough to communicate the benefits of same to normal people, bright enough to lead the organization of various events and groups and dumb enough to actually think that by herding tribbles I could help get us into said space colonies in 15 years. What are tribbles? Try Google or Wikipedia, sonny.
Anyway, David Brandt-Erichsen sent out a letter to all board members telling us about a thing called the Byte Information Exchange (BIX for short). Noted SF author Jerry Pournelle had set up a conference on BIX for L5 board members. I used my brand new computer -- an AT&T PC with TWO floppy drives and 256K of memory -- to access BIX via a 1200 baud modem that was the envy of my friends who only had 300 baud modems. Since Jerry was jerryp on BIX, I picked the BIX name chuckd. It was much later that I learned there was a rapper by the name of Chuck D. C'est la vie....
Anyway, BIX was a wonderful place to discuss space politics, space technology, information technology and lots more. When I posted an essay that I wrote that had appeared in the meatspace Trenton Times, my reputation as a thoughtful writer was sealed. OK, some of the people doing the judging were a bit out there. Still, though, my stock rose enormously in cyberspace.
While on BIX, we heard stories of the fabled Internet and Usenet. Back in the 1980s they were operated by the GOVERNMENT. The discussions had to be better and more informed. Well, by the early 90s I was working at Goddard Space Flight Center (another source of funny stories, if you find making fun of the mentally ill funny) and I actually got access to the Internet and Usenet. I decided, just for practice, to take a look at rec.arts.sf.tv. Imagine my surprise when I found ignorant university undergraduates praising the 1970s version of Battlestar (or was it Cattle Car?) Galactica. That show was mediocre at best.
OK, by then I had two identities in cyberspace. There was still chuckd on BIX. There was also xrcjd at Goddard. I got my first spam as xrcjd@dirac.gsfc.gov! I still remember the spams advertising millions and millions of e-mail addresses. The advertisers, though, thoughtfully removed all .edu, .mil and .gov addresses. Hmm, I thought, they weren't using their own product. Once an idiotic, sexually frigid manager accused me of using gummint computers to look at porn based on one such piece of spam. Ah, those were the days.
It was at Goddard in 1995 that I created my first website. It was to support the work of the group of which I was a part. Yes, sonny, I can write HTML at the bare metal level. Woohoo!
Later on I finally bought a more up to date PC for my home. The 1986 machine finally burned out. The new computer became my first Linux box. The machine came with no software. When I checked out the prices of software at a local store, I freaked out. A friend at Goddard, Meg Larko, acquainted me with Linux. It was FREE! And actually pretty good. OK, normal people, like newbie Dickie McCormick, couldn't have used it. But it worked pretty well for an experienced cyberspace citizen like me.
Anyway, I signed up first for Earthlink. I became chuckdivine@earthlink.net. Then a friend told me Earthlink was run by Scientologists. Bye bye, Earthlink, hello att.net. I became chuck.divine@worldnet.att.net. I also upgraded to a 56K modem. Boy, was that fast! I could really zip around the Internet at warp speed now! I could read and post on Slashdot -- with nearly 4 million readers. On Slashdot my identity was ChuckDivine. My karma is still excellent. My posts, especially about space exploration, garnered +5 ratings -- the highest possible. Only Cthulthu knows how many people read that crap. And, as you know, Cthulthu won't tell unless you give him a really big bribe. I don't post nearly as much there as I once did, but I do try to look at Slashdot at least once a week. This week I checked out the comments about the awful TV show "The Big Bang Theory." Slashdotters didn't like it either.
Then I got involved in AIAA. My involvement in the Baltimore Section got me to upgrade to a broadband account with Comcast. Today I'm chuck.divine@comcast.net. I even have my own set of websites -- yes, sonny, websites -- on Comcast. My home page has links to most of them. Be careful, though. A couple of pages are NSFW. Oh, the character Ambassador Chuck is totally fictional. I was really stunned when some 419 actually replied to the good ambassador.
After some years of posting on various blogs like Rand Simberg's and even getting an occasional e-mail posted by Jerry Pournelle, I decided to start this blog myself. I haven't made too many waves yet, but time will tell.
I've heard of things like Facebook and Myspace, but, truthfully, they're a bit simple minded for long time cybercitizens like me. They're fine for newbies, though. Perhaps Dickie McCormick should surf on over and give them a try. I'd be glad to make comments when he does.
------------End of colloquial mode------------------------
OK, all, now I'm going to assume a more serious demeanor. I've been writing like this to give people who aren't as familiar with cyberspace a bit of a look at what the wild, wild Internet is really like. Yes, there are very corporate websites that present established organizations quite well. People do go to them to get honest information about what such organizations are intentionally doing. Rutgers has a pretty good set of websites.
When the new alumni plan, though, talks about connecting with the community via blast e-mails from President McCormick (whom I do highly respect), I wonder what they are thinking. If it's some vitally important piece of information of importance to the entire Rutgers community, that might be the way to go. But that kind of communication doesn't really connect people -- especially alumni -- to Rutgers. What might be a better approach would be to establish web fora much like Slashdot where old friends could reconnect, where former students could connect with faculty, where alumni in various geographic localities could start clubs to connect local grads together, where alumni in various subgroups could connect with each other and where ways of helping alumni from various subgroups connect with people outside their groups. That's a more organic, democratic approach which might strengthen bonds among Rutgers grads and the university.
The new plan also talks about things like a more meaningful Homecoming. Have people thought that through? I attended my first Rutgers football game not as a college student but as a guest of my father, class of 1935. My mom came along. I was just a child. When the original Rutgers Stadium was built, it could accommodate over 20,000 people. Back in 1938 when it opened, that number was a quite sizable part of the entire Rutgers family -- students, faculty, alumni and family members. Today the much larger stadium can accommodate only 40K+ people. The larger Rutgers family easily tops 1 million. What do people have in mind?
I'd be more impressed if, in this past year, the committee that produced the report had spent time contacting alumni and listening to them. I'm webmaster of the Rutgers Club of DC and just took on that role for the class of 1967. I get e-mails from alumni relations and the local clubs as well as some from clubs around the country. Before writing this piece, I searched through my old e-mails over the past year. I didn't find anything about the work of this committee.
Old alums like myself clearly aren't the entire Rutgers community. But just what did this committee do? It's not like some of us are hard to find.
A few token meetings now that the report has come out are not going to help all that much.
What thoughts do you have? Feel free to post comments here.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
A Few Observations
I have mentioned to a few of you that, before I got into information technology as a career, that I did graduate work in physics (no surprise there) and also, later, in social psychology (possibly a few raised eyebrows). While in both fields I also became first an exceptionally good photographer and decent writer. People in the ballet world claim I could have been a successful ballet photographer if I had chosen that path.
I'm going to put on my social psychologist hat now and make a few observations about things I've seen and learned both while working in aerospace and have read before and since full time work in our field.
I will use Mike Griffin as an example. From what I can tell, he is a good man, exceptionally intelligent and accomplished in aerospace. He does have some shortcomings as do we all.
Mike Griffin was born in 1949 according to his NASA biography. When Mike was a little boy back in the 1950s, people were already taking note of the estrangement between scientists,engineers and the general public. Too few people, it was thought, were choosing technical careers. Outsiders viewed technical work as important – think of how technology shaped World War II and other fields in mid century – but viewed technical people as “weird” and “not like normal people.” One response to this mindset was for technical people to draw apart from the societal mainstream. Who wants to associate with people who view you in some ways negatively? Psychologists call this phenomenon negative reinforcement. When you couple it with the positive reinforcement of hanging with people like you who think like you do, you can get a subgroup that interacts with the larger society with increasing difficulty.
Sputnik was launched when Mike was 8. That served as a wake up call to the United States. Scientists and engineers might be “weird” but they did important things for the nation. Technical education was given a boost – a positive reinforcement. Our first attempts to compete with the Russians were failures. If this string of failures had continued, I do not know what would have happened to technical endeavors. Instead, though, initial failure was followed by quick success. Vanguard 1 failed. A few months later, Explorer 1 was a success. Other failures were followed by quick successes. A different model came into play. In 1941 the United States was surprised by Pearl Harbor. There were other defeats early in the war. But these defeats were followed by successes and eventual total victory over particularly negatively viewed opponents. The early years of the space race seemed to replay this scenario.
By the time Mike was 13, the United States had successfully launched men into space. People who did this were praised – another positive reinforcement – and rewarded financially – more positive reinforcement. Programs were expanded. Demand for technically trained people increased. By the time Mike entered college, the space field had heated up to a great extent. The first lunar landing happened while Mike was in college. This, obviously, was still more positive reinforcement to continue in technical fields. There were also some interesting things occurring in fields a bit removed from NASA. The film “2001: A Space Odyssey” came out. It has proved to be an enduring classic. It projected major future triumphs for the space field – space stations, commercial travel to space, passenger vehicles operating between Earth orbit and the Moon, a Moon base, even a manned mission to Jupiter. Technological optimists like Gerard K. O'Neill and Peter Glaser predicted giant cities in space and solar power satellites providing energy to Earth. These things were supposed to happen within our lifetimes.
After Apollo, however, the nation turned its attention to other matters. Budgets were slashed. People in the space field thought it was because outsiders didn't fully understand the tremendous potential of the field. Education and outreach efforts were launched. Some attention was initially paid.
Triumphs, while slowed down because of budget cuts, kept on coming. When Mike was in his twenties, Viking landed on Mars and Voyager began its journey through the Solar System. The discoveries made by these craft excited techies – and some of the public. There we see still more positive reinforcement of pursuit of technical fields.
The launch of Columbia in 1981 happened when Mike was 31. It seemed like the first step to the visions of space stations and regular use of space.
In short, we see Mike – and any number of contemporaries – positively reinforced for pursuing technical careers. The fact that there were setbacks makes the reinforcement only partial. But partial reinforcement can be quite powerful. Just think of gambling. Over the long haul, players lose. But their losses are broken up by wins. Let me note here, though, that gambling has major and critical differences with aerospace. While in one sense we are “playing against the house”, i.e., nature, our wins are lasting and build upon previous wins. The only way “the house” can win is if we slip into a dark age. One must note, though, that even the collapse of the Roman Empire did not lead to a permanent victory for nature. There was just a truly major delay in what we call progress.
Now let's compare Mike – and his contemporaries – to someone who was born in December 1972 after the last manned landing on the Moon. Their contemporaries tended to see techies as weird – and not nearly as important now that the Space Race had been won. While there are a few triumphs while these people are small children, the triumphs are not met with the same applause as the early triumphs in the late 50s and early 60s. In short, the positive reinforcement is less in both amounts and frequency.
Remember how Mike saw stunning triumphs by the age of 13? Shortly after their 13th birthdays, our younger colleagues saw Challenger blow up on television while they were in school watching the “Teacher in Space” take off. Talk about negative reinforcement... Not only was a shuttle lost with a crew, problems with the shuttle program surfaced. Many people stopped viewing the shuttle as a success and a step toward the Pan Am shuttle of 2001. Some people stopped trusting NASA. That's another negative reinforcement.
Hubble was launched in 1990 – with flawed optics because engineers basically screwed up and didn't do appropriate testing. Our first post Apollo generation hits college. Yes, Hubble was eventually fixed, but the initial screwup is vividly imprinted on our post Apollo generation. This is another negative reinforcement.
There was a successful Mars probe – complete with rover – in 1997. This, unfortunately, was followed up by a few real screwups with successors.
Our post Apollo generation hit their 30th birthdays in December of 2002. On February 1st, 2003, Columbia burns up on reentry. That same year a damning report about the failure comes out. Instead of being positively viewed role models, the older generation comes to be seen as dysfunctional and failing.
This can be pretty daunting for members of our younger generation who are enthusiastic about science and technology. Their peers, who are not really interested in science and technology, see those going into science and technology not as “weird, but important” but as just plain “weird” and to be avoided if not dominated and controlled. The failures and scandals serve as justifications for cutting funding for things like aerospace. This constitutes even more negative reinforcement.
There have been other changes since Mike was a little boy growing into a young man. Schools have shifted to a more top down bureaucratic model than existed in the 1950s. High schools have doubled in average size since the early 1970s, from about 1200 to 2400 students. There is some evidence that humans have real difficulty in dealing with large numbers of people. Some people are now advancing the idea that high schools should have only 600 to 900 students. Some experiments which have broken up large high schools into multiple academies – still in the same building – show better learning and healthier behavior in such environments. One way of coping with too many people is to withdraw into a subgroup much like oneself. This can hurt communications with people different from oneself simply because one gets much less practice at it. One way people who administer such schools have changed is that they now emphasize control more than their predecessors did in the 1950s and 1960s. Some people also have raised questions about some other changes in the way we bring up our young. For example, sports have been raised in importance much beyond what was normal in the 1950s and 1960s. One consequence of this phenomenon is that some teenagers are now being roused out of bed as early as 4 AM to participate in sports. This causes significant sleep deprivation which makes high level critical thinking much more difficult.
So far I have emphasized the negative. I have done this to get people's attention. I hope most recipients of this attempt at discussion have read this far. Believe it or not, I am keeping this short.
So – is the aerospace industry doomed to collapse in the United States? No – not at all. Change, though, is needed. Some people are already responding well to change. Some others have weathered the storms of the past decades and can be positive role models for the future. We can learn new things. Even old people – much older than the middle aged people who are most of the recipients of this message – can and do learn new things.
What's the first thing we can do? Believe it or not, admit to failure. This might sound weird, but respect, even esteem, by others increases when people admit to mistakes. In part this happens because it shows a recognition of reality. It also communicates to others a recognition of their own worth. Even a partial agreement says to the other person(s) “You have something to contribute because we don't know it all.”
We can also learn from role models – and praise such role models. One such role model among the people to whom I am sending this little piece of analysis is Jon Malay. Back when he was president of the American Astronautical Society I sent him an e-mail praising a column he had written for Space Times and suggesting an expansion of his ideas. He responded thoughtfully. Simply listening to others when you have a leadership position is positively reinforcing for said others. The fact that Jon agreed with my observations only increased my positive reinforcement. When Jon stood up at the AIAA Regional Leaders Conference in 2005 and said “I'm probably the most right brained person in this room” I had two thoughts. The first was a friendly “I might be able to give you a run for your money on that.” The second was here was a man somewhat like myself who could be a friend and from whom I could learn quite a bit. When I joined AIAA and started showing up at Baltimore Section events and trying to help, Tom Milnes – along with others – was friendly and encouraging. The section welcomed my efforts as webmaster. They followed my lead on Congressional Visits Day activities. They even – to my complete surprise – chose me as Vice Chair for a year. The last was a real surprise in large part because I thought it was too soon. Still, though, even that was positively reinforcing.
Since then I have gotten to know people better in the AIAA, especially the National Capital and Baltimore sections. All of you that I have gotten to know have demonstrated significant leadership ability, including the willingness and ability to listen to others. Can one say such things about everyone in aerospace management? I will not discuss people whom I have had little opportunity to observe. Unfortunately, I have personally witnessed people with extraordinarily poor leadership skills in management – even some with major management responsibilities – who have done significant damage to their organizations. I will not discuss these people in this short note.
There are other people who, if reports are to be believed, are serving as positive role models. One person is Simon “Pete” Worden, currently director of Ames. People who work at Ames praise him. Another is the recent Noble Prize winner John Mather. A few months ago I had the opportunity to discuss Mather with a good man that I personally knew from my time at Goddard who works with Mather. This man had nothing but praise for Mather, describing him as a leader who listened and who gave credit where credit was due. That squares with my own necessarily limited observations.
Why haven't I mentioned Mike Griffin? Mostly because I have had little opportunity to observe the man and because some people with at least some credibility have raised some issues about his leadership. In short, I know too little about him. What little I do know is generally positive.
There are other positive things going on. The younger generation does have a favorable view of the work on space tourism – things like Burt Rutan's Space Ship One. While people in their twenties might not be much interested in watching a handful of astronauts take a many year trip to Mars, the possibility of taking a short excursion into space themselves does attract support. They also are quite interested in the discoveries made by the probes on Mars. They can watch that work and participate at least a little bit. In short, the younger generation is not interested in simply sitting and watching but wants active involvement.
The work that NASA and NOAA are doing with regard to understanding climate change and other environmental concerns also attracts support. Once again, this is selling people things that they can benefit from themselves. The computer industry did not achieve its current success by selling computers to the government on contract but by selling tools that people in all kinds of endeavors could use to make their lives better and help their organizations succeed.
What else can people in AIAA – and, for that matter, our friendly sister organization the American Astronautical Society – do to promote healthy, responsible leadership? One thing people can do is to start learning about a dimension of leadership that draws too little attention these days in many circles. The dimension is the democratic-authoritarian. The two styles are markedly different. In some circumstances, the authoritarian model is entirely appropriate. In others, democratic leadership – leadership which listens and tries to develop consensus and is flexible enough to respond effectively to surprises works better. Oh – democratic leadership does not mean taking a vote on every decision. That is an incorrect perception that some people have.
I will recommend a particularly good book for people to read – DeMarco and Lister's Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams. It is well researched and is consistent with what I learned while in social psychology. People who are considering business school should also consider an emphasis that includes some social science work. The social sciences are not as hard and fast as, for example, aeronautical engineering, but they have made genuine contributions to understanding. At least graduates of such programs will not be completely surprised when something fails because of some human social factor comes into play. They will also be more able to clean up the resulting mess.
I think that is enough for now. I've written over 2600 words.
I'm going to put on my social psychologist hat now and make a few observations about things I've seen and learned both while working in aerospace and have read before and since full time work in our field.
I will use Mike Griffin as an example. From what I can tell, he is a good man, exceptionally intelligent and accomplished in aerospace. He does have some shortcomings as do we all.
Mike Griffin was born in 1949 according to his NASA biography. When Mike was a little boy back in the 1950s, people were already taking note of the estrangement between scientists,engineers and the general public. Too few people, it was thought, were choosing technical careers. Outsiders viewed technical work as important – think of how technology shaped World War II and other fields in mid century – but viewed technical people as “weird” and “not like normal people.” One response to this mindset was for technical people to draw apart from the societal mainstream. Who wants to associate with people who view you in some ways negatively? Psychologists call this phenomenon negative reinforcement. When you couple it with the positive reinforcement of hanging with people like you who think like you do, you can get a subgroup that interacts with the larger society with increasing difficulty.
Sputnik was launched when Mike was 8. That served as a wake up call to the United States. Scientists and engineers might be “weird” but they did important things for the nation. Technical education was given a boost – a positive reinforcement. Our first attempts to compete with the Russians were failures. If this string of failures had continued, I do not know what would have happened to technical endeavors. Instead, though, initial failure was followed by quick success. Vanguard 1 failed. A few months later, Explorer 1 was a success. Other failures were followed by quick successes. A different model came into play. In 1941 the United States was surprised by Pearl Harbor. There were other defeats early in the war. But these defeats were followed by successes and eventual total victory over particularly negatively viewed opponents. The early years of the space race seemed to replay this scenario.
By the time Mike was 13, the United States had successfully launched men into space. People who did this were praised – another positive reinforcement – and rewarded financially – more positive reinforcement. Programs were expanded. Demand for technically trained people increased. By the time Mike entered college, the space field had heated up to a great extent. The first lunar landing happened while Mike was in college. This, obviously, was still more positive reinforcement to continue in technical fields. There were also some interesting things occurring in fields a bit removed from NASA. The film “2001: A Space Odyssey” came out. It has proved to be an enduring classic. It projected major future triumphs for the space field – space stations, commercial travel to space, passenger vehicles operating between Earth orbit and the Moon, a Moon base, even a manned mission to Jupiter. Technological optimists like Gerard K. O'Neill and Peter Glaser predicted giant cities in space and solar power satellites providing energy to Earth. These things were supposed to happen within our lifetimes.
After Apollo, however, the nation turned its attention to other matters. Budgets were slashed. People in the space field thought it was because outsiders didn't fully understand the tremendous potential of the field. Education and outreach efforts were launched. Some attention was initially paid.
Triumphs, while slowed down because of budget cuts, kept on coming. When Mike was in his twenties, Viking landed on Mars and Voyager began its journey through the Solar System. The discoveries made by these craft excited techies – and some of the public. There we see still more positive reinforcement of pursuit of technical fields.
The launch of Columbia in 1981 happened when Mike was 31. It seemed like the first step to the visions of space stations and regular use of space.
In short, we see Mike – and any number of contemporaries – positively reinforced for pursuing technical careers. The fact that there were setbacks makes the reinforcement only partial. But partial reinforcement can be quite powerful. Just think of gambling. Over the long haul, players lose. But their losses are broken up by wins. Let me note here, though, that gambling has major and critical differences with aerospace. While in one sense we are “playing against the house”, i.e., nature, our wins are lasting and build upon previous wins. The only way “the house” can win is if we slip into a dark age. One must note, though, that even the collapse of the Roman Empire did not lead to a permanent victory for nature. There was just a truly major delay in what we call progress.
Now let's compare Mike – and his contemporaries – to someone who was born in December 1972 after the last manned landing on the Moon. Their contemporaries tended to see techies as weird – and not nearly as important now that the Space Race had been won. While there are a few triumphs while these people are small children, the triumphs are not met with the same applause as the early triumphs in the late 50s and early 60s. In short, the positive reinforcement is less in both amounts and frequency.
Remember how Mike saw stunning triumphs by the age of 13? Shortly after their 13th birthdays, our younger colleagues saw Challenger blow up on television while they were in school watching the “Teacher in Space” take off. Talk about negative reinforcement... Not only was a shuttle lost with a crew, problems with the shuttle program surfaced. Many people stopped viewing the shuttle as a success and a step toward the Pan Am shuttle of 2001. Some people stopped trusting NASA. That's another negative reinforcement.
Hubble was launched in 1990 – with flawed optics because engineers basically screwed up and didn't do appropriate testing. Our first post Apollo generation hits college. Yes, Hubble was eventually fixed, but the initial screwup is vividly imprinted on our post Apollo generation. This is another negative reinforcement.
There was a successful Mars probe – complete with rover – in 1997. This, unfortunately, was followed up by a few real screwups with successors.
Our post Apollo generation hit their 30th birthdays in December of 2002. On February 1st, 2003, Columbia burns up on reentry. That same year a damning report about the failure comes out. Instead of being positively viewed role models, the older generation comes to be seen as dysfunctional and failing.
This can be pretty daunting for members of our younger generation who are enthusiastic about science and technology. Their peers, who are not really interested in science and technology, see those going into science and technology not as “weird, but important” but as just plain “weird” and to be avoided if not dominated and controlled. The failures and scandals serve as justifications for cutting funding for things like aerospace. This constitutes even more negative reinforcement.
There have been other changes since Mike was a little boy growing into a young man. Schools have shifted to a more top down bureaucratic model than existed in the 1950s. High schools have doubled in average size since the early 1970s, from about 1200 to 2400 students. There is some evidence that humans have real difficulty in dealing with large numbers of people. Some people are now advancing the idea that high schools should have only 600 to 900 students. Some experiments which have broken up large high schools into multiple academies – still in the same building – show better learning and healthier behavior in such environments. One way of coping with too many people is to withdraw into a subgroup much like oneself. This can hurt communications with people different from oneself simply because one gets much less practice at it. One way people who administer such schools have changed is that they now emphasize control more than their predecessors did in the 1950s and 1960s. Some people also have raised questions about some other changes in the way we bring up our young. For example, sports have been raised in importance much beyond what was normal in the 1950s and 1960s. One consequence of this phenomenon is that some teenagers are now being roused out of bed as early as 4 AM to participate in sports. This causes significant sleep deprivation which makes high level critical thinking much more difficult.
So far I have emphasized the negative. I have done this to get people's attention. I hope most recipients of this attempt at discussion have read this far. Believe it or not, I am keeping this short.
So – is the aerospace industry doomed to collapse in the United States? No – not at all. Change, though, is needed. Some people are already responding well to change. Some others have weathered the storms of the past decades and can be positive role models for the future. We can learn new things. Even old people – much older than the middle aged people who are most of the recipients of this message – can and do learn new things.
What's the first thing we can do? Believe it or not, admit to failure. This might sound weird, but respect, even esteem, by others increases when people admit to mistakes. In part this happens because it shows a recognition of reality. It also communicates to others a recognition of their own worth. Even a partial agreement says to the other person(s) “You have something to contribute because we don't know it all.”
We can also learn from role models – and praise such role models. One such role model among the people to whom I am sending this little piece of analysis is Jon Malay. Back when he was president of the American Astronautical Society I sent him an e-mail praising a column he had written for Space Times and suggesting an expansion of his ideas. He responded thoughtfully. Simply listening to others when you have a leadership position is positively reinforcing for said others. The fact that Jon agreed with my observations only increased my positive reinforcement. When Jon stood up at the AIAA Regional Leaders Conference in 2005 and said “I'm probably the most right brained person in this room” I had two thoughts. The first was a friendly “I might be able to give you a run for your money on that.” The second was here was a man somewhat like myself who could be a friend and from whom I could learn quite a bit. When I joined AIAA and started showing up at Baltimore Section events and trying to help, Tom Milnes – along with others – was friendly and encouraging. The section welcomed my efforts as webmaster. They followed my lead on Congressional Visits Day activities. They even – to my complete surprise – chose me as Vice Chair for a year. The last was a real surprise in large part because I thought it was too soon. Still, though, even that was positively reinforcing.
Since then I have gotten to know people better in the AIAA, especially the National Capital and Baltimore sections. All of you that I have gotten to know have demonstrated significant leadership ability, including the willingness and ability to listen to others. Can one say such things about everyone in aerospace management? I will not discuss people whom I have had little opportunity to observe. Unfortunately, I have personally witnessed people with extraordinarily poor leadership skills in management – even some with major management responsibilities – who have done significant damage to their organizations. I will not discuss these people in this short note.
There are other people who, if reports are to be believed, are serving as positive role models. One person is Simon “Pete” Worden, currently director of Ames. People who work at Ames praise him. Another is the recent Noble Prize winner John Mather. A few months ago I had the opportunity to discuss Mather with a good man that I personally knew from my time at Goddard who works with Mather. This man had nothing but praise for Mather, describing him as a leader who listened and who gave credit where credit was due. That squares with my own necessarily limited observations.
Why haven't I mentioned Mike Griffin? Mostly because I have had little opportunity to observe the man and because some people with at least some credibility have raised some issues about his leadership. In short, I know too little about him. What little I do know is generally positive.
There are other positive things going on. The younger generation does have a favorable view of the work on space tourism – things like Burt Rutan's Space Ship One. While people in their twenties might not be much interested in watching a handful of astronauts take a many year trip to Mars, the possibility of taking a short excursion into space themselves does attract support. They also are quite interested in the discoveries made by the probes on Mars. They can watch that work and participate at least a little bit. In short, the younger generation is not interested in simply sitting and watching but wants active involvement.
The work that NASA and NOAA are doing with regard to understanding climate change and other environmental concerns also attracts support. Once again, this is selling people things that they can benefit from themselves. The computer industry did not achieve its current success by selling computers to the government on contract but by selling tools that people in all kinds of endeavors could use to make their lives better and help their organizations succeed.
What else can people in AIAA – and, for that matter, our friendly sister organization the American Astronautical Society – do to promote healthy, responsible leadership? One thing people can do is to start learning about a dimension of leadership that draws too little attention these days in many circles. The dimension is the democratic-authoritarian. The two styles are markedly different. In some circumstances, the authoritarian model is entirely appropriate. In others, democratic leadership – leadership which listens and tries to develop consensus and is flexible enough to respond effectively to surprises works better. Oh – democratic leadership does not mean taking a vote on every decision. That is an incorrect perception that some people have.
I will recommend a particularly good book for people to read – DeMarco and Lister's Peopleware: Productive Projects and Teams. It is well researched and is consistent with what I learned while in social psychology. People who are considering business school should also consider an emphasis that includes some social science work. The social sciences are not as hard and fast as, for example, aeronautical engineering, but they have made genuine contributions to understanding. At least graduates of such programs will not be completely surprised when something fails because of some human social factor comes into play. They will also be more able to clean up the resulting mess.
I think that is enough for now. I've written over 2600 words.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
Energy From Space Luncheon
On August 8th I attended a luncheon organized by the Marshall Institute. The speakers were Martin Hoffert and John Mankins. Fortunately, the Marshall Institute already has put up the slides used by Marty Hoffert and John Mankins.
Hoffert emphasized a number of points. There is an urgent bipartisan issue in taking a rational, objective look at our technological civilization continuing to burn carbon based fuels for energy. Global warming is one factor. The fact that such fuels are quite limited is another factor.
Hoffert noted that terrestrial wind and solar power are limited by storage. Denmark has the most energy obtained by wind percentage wise of any nation. They are situated quite close to neighboring Norway which uses hyrdoelectric power for its energy. What Denmark does is, when the wind is blowing sufficiently for a surplus to be generated, exports via electricity energy to Norway. Hydroelectric facilities in Norway pump water up into reservoirs. The water is released when Denmark's winds are producing less or even no energy. Hoffert suggested other places could use compressed air for energy storage.
Hoffert made an interesting observation about engineering and accounting. Enron, he said, was all about creative accounting, not creative engineering. Even if they had been honest, they did not advance energy technology. I will add that people in the United States have become more isolated from people different from them in recent decades. One Congressional staffer told me during the AIAA's Congressional Visits Day in April that they needed more people like your typical AIAA member working in Congress full time because people in Congress did not really understand science and technology and how the fields worked. One consequence of this isolation is that, for example, creative accountants can make proposals to increase profits that neglect to consider the downside of their proposals. Yes, you can fire inarticulate engineers but the consequences down the road are likely to be negative. This argues for engineers to learn more than just basic engineering as well.
Hoffert noted that early proposals for solar power satellites depended upon technologies that are far more primitive than ones we have today. For example, back in the 1970s, transmitting antennas required heavy, complex klystron tube based technology. Since then electronics has progressed to the point where much more flexible solid state technology may be used, thus simplifying the transmission. He also noted that the Carter administration invested heavily in SPS. The Reagan administration terminated this effort. At the time the proposal looked wildly expensive because of the limited technology available.
European aerospace engineers have proposed an interesting concept. They advocate a system where there would be laser transmission directly to the Sahara where solar cells would be generating power anyway because of naturally occurring sunlight. Such a system could provide electricity up to one terawatt at a cost of $0.05/kwh.
John Mankins made a number of points:
Mankins noted that there have been many changes since 1980:
A reporter asked if Congress was showing interest. Mankins replied that support was not currently well organized but was persistent. Support was better organized in the past.
Hoffert commented that SPS needs a champion. DOE needs a champion because the department is dominated by chemical and mechanical engineers who do not think of the space option. NASA doesn't think about getting energy from space. I will comment here that, once again, we see engineers sticking to their specialties, not looking at the broader picture and learning to work with people different from themselves. Hoffert added that we are far behind other countries in science and technical education, especially for leaders. Once again we see narrowness triumphing over broader, healthier ways of doing things. He pointed out that the Internet was initially developed for 20 years under DARPA and an additional 10 under the NSF before the Wall Street Journal noticed it.
This was an interesting luncheon. Once again, I saw many of the usual suspects one finds at DC events relating to space. Among them were Paul Werbos, Gary Oleson, Jeff Foust, Anne Ellis and J. P. Stevens of AIA. The last time I saw John Mankins was at a Hillary Clinton issues and policies breakfast. It was interesting seeing him give a talk for the Marshall Institute at the Capitol Hill Club. The club is a Republican bastion right next to Congress.
The energy from space community is getting some attention. It will be interesting to see if it gathers more support than in the past. The fact that a demonstrator project for only $100 M seems to be possible will be a major improvement over the past. Back in the 1970s many ideas (SPS and O'Neill colonies among them) were pushed and attracted some attention. The realities of technology at the time stopped many a dream. One truly limiting factor was the space shuttle. Instead of giving us cheap, reliable access to space, it became an extremely expensive, unreliable vehicle that could only be flown a few times a year rather than weekly.
Hoffert emphasized a number of points. There is an urgent bipartisan issue in taking a rational, objective look at our technological civilization continuing to burn carbon based fuels for energy. Global warming is one factor. The fact that such fuels are quite limited is another factor.
Hoffert noted that terrestrial wind and solar power are limited by storage. Denmark has the most energy obtained by wind percentage wise of any nation. They are situated quite close to neighboring Norway which uses hyrdoelectric power for its energy. What Denmark does is, when the wind is blowing sufficiently for a surplus to be generated, exports via electricity energy to Norway. Hydroelectric facilities in Norway pump water up into reservoirs. The water is released when Denmark's winds are producing less or even no energy. Hoffert suggested other places could use compressed air for energy storage.
Hoffert made an interesting observation about engineering and accounting. Enron, he said, was all about creative accounting, not creative engineering. Even if they had been honest, they did not advance energy technology. I will add that people in the United States have become more isolated from people different from them in recent decades. One Congressional staffer told me during the AIAA's Congressional Visits Day in April that they needed more people like your typical AIAA member working in Congress full time because people in Congress did not really understand science and technology and how the fields worked. One consequence of this isolation is that, for example, creative accountants can make proposals to increase profits that neglect to consider the downside of their proposals. Yes, you can fire inarticulate engineers but the consequences down the road are likely to be negative. This argues for engineers to learn more than just basic engineering as well.
Hoffert noted that early proposals for solar power satellites depended upon technologies that are far more primitive than ones we have today. For example, back in the 1970s, transmitting antennas required heavy, complex klystron tube based technology. Since then electronics has progressed to the point where much more flexible solid state technology may be used, thus simplifying the transmission. He also noted that the Carter administration invested heavily in SPS. The Reagan administration terminated this effort. At the time the proposal looked wildly expensive because of the limited technology available.
European aerospace engineers have proposed an interesting concept. They advocate a system where there would be laser transmission directly to the Sahara where solar cells would be generating power anyway because of naturally occurring sunlight. Such a system could provide electricity up to one terawatt at a cost of $0.05/kwh.
John Mankins made a number of points:
- The world's population is growing with people dissatisfied living below the poverty line.
- International competition for energy is becoming a security concern.
- There is a growing need for considerable carbon neutral energy.
- Keeping a long term scientific and technological society going is a major challenge.
- Attention to the energy problem is growing.
- In the past, while technically feasible, energy from space was not economically feasible. Early plans would have required $300B to $1T to be spent before the first SPS came online.
Mankins noted that there have been many changes since 1980:
- Solar cells are much more efficient.
- Solid state transmission is now possible.
- Robotics has advanced.
- A radically different, modular technology is now possible.
- Making synthetic fuels partly dependent on solar is now possible.
A reporter asked if Congress was showing interest. Mankins replied that support was not currently well organized but was persistent. Support was better organized in the past.
Hoffert commented that SPS needs a champion. DOE needs a champion because the department is dominated by chemical and mechanical engineers who do not think of the space option. NASA doesn't think about getting energy from space. I will comment here that, once again, we see engineers sticking to their specialties, not looking at the broader picture and learning to work with people different from themselves. Hoffert added that we are far behind other countries in science and technical education, especially for leaders. Once again we see narrowness triumphing over broader, healthier ways of doing things. He pointed out that the Internet was initially developed for 20 years under DARPA and an additional 10 under the NSF before the Wall Street Journal noticed it.
This was an interesting luncheon. Once again, I saw many of the usual suspects one finds at DC events relating to space. Among them were Paul Werbos, Gary Oleson, Jeff Foust, Anne Ellis and J. P. Stevens of AIA. The last time I saw John Mankins was at a Hillary Clinton issues and policies breakfast. It was interesting seeing him give a talk for the Marshall Institute at the Capitol Hill Club. The club is a Republican bastion right next to Congress.
The energy from space community is getting some attention. It will be interesting to see if it gathers more support than in the past. The fact that a demonstrator project for only $100 M seems to be possible will be a major improvement over the past. Back in the 1970s many ideas (SPS and O'Neill colonies among them) were pushed and attracted some attention. The realities of technology at the time stopped many a dream. One truly limiting factor was the space shuttle. Instead of giving us cheap, reliable access to space, it became an extremely expensive, unreliable vehicle that could only be flown a few times a year rather than weekly.
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