Author: Connor Mann

4/22 Class Notes

Discussion: Shop Class as Soulcraft Ch. 7

• Chloe: People nowadays have a preference for algorithms instead of thinking
• Connor: Bureaucracy is an example of how algorithms are slowly replacing thinking.
• Dr. Littman: What is the idea behind this chess master?
• Ainsley: IBM was able to program a computer to beat a chess grandmaster because the computer had a massive database to draw from.
• Rashmiya: We do a lot better at thinking abstractly and generally than computers.
• Zane: There is a book where an EMP goes off and people had to turn to the 70+ year old experts, and were unable to rebuild society.
• Chloe: If you are going to draw information randomly then you will draw incorrect conclusions. I am confused about what he is talking about here.
• Dr. Littman: He gave an example about certain meters which are either accurate or precise – accurate meaning it is close to the correct value but not at a very close value. Precise meaning it is an extremely detailed value but it is not the actual value. With this meter, the needle keeps moving between the two.
• Chloe: He mentions the valves in this section
• Dr Littman: Engine group, how did you get the valves lined up?
• Eugene: We had to match the angles of the valves with the seating and apply a sort’ve paste while they rotated in order to get a nice, tight fit with the valves.
• Chloe: As a manual author, you are acting as a social interlocutor between the machine and the human. On one hand you have to be extremely technically savvy in order to understand the part, but you also have to be socially savvy in order to be able to explain the part in terms that makes sense for a wide array of people to be able to understand.
• Rashmiya: The guy who won the French scrabble championship didn’t speak any French. He just memorized a bunch of French words and was really good at Scrabble.

Chapter 8

• Chloe: A lot of the work we do on a daily basis is divided by this line. Part of what we do is work on getting our diploma, doing our homework, updating our LinkedIn. Then the other part is, for example, I go to dance practice because I want to do that work for the sake of leisure, for the intrinsic practice of dancing only due to my enjoyment of it.
• Nate: Americans live to work while the Spanish work to live.
• Dr. Littman: He uses the example of the Mortgage Broker. He works hard to make money so he can go on vacation. Certainly there are people who enjoy what they do for work. But for most people, working is just a means to make money so they can do things they enjoy.
• Chloe: I find it interesting that people who are attracted to things like engineering are also the people who are likely to make a practical decision for a career.
• Ainsley: Leisure is something that we do if we have time. It is not something that is built into our lives. There will always be reasons in your life to keep working and pursuing something. My friends in Sweden just work for 8 hours and then go have fun with their friends.
• Chloe: For me, dance is equally as important as my future career. For my friend who dances with me, her hobby is math.
• Dr. Littman: As you all get older, your perspective may change. Once you have kids and you need to start making different financial sacrifices, your outlook may change.
• Ben: I love coding, I will always be coding. I want to code for the rest of my life. I will be pursuing a less money-centric aspect of computer science. There may be times when I make less money but there are things like summer internships where I can make a bit more money.
• Chloe: Let’s look at pg. 186. I don’t know about you guys, but I am not taking this class just to look at some motorcycle spokes and walking away. I want to see the whole motorcycle come together. Thoughts?
• Ainsley: It is all about your personal values.
• Vanessa: When working in an office, the validation you get is from the approval of others, whereas with a mechanic, the validation they get is the car and motor turn on and are working properly.
• Zane: The way I look at each major is each major will cultivate a different skill. So really, it is more about the soft skills they gain while earning their degree. In short, it is not about the knowledge they gain, but the journey to acquire that knowledge.
• Dr Littman: The author talks about how the person who makes the Rolls Royce has great pride in his work product even though he doesn’t get to see his work product being used because it brings satisfaction to him, and maybe recognition to him among those in his community.
• Dr. Littman: In the next chapter, this comes back to the nature of work. Is it Darwinian? So people frolic in order to survive, or do they survive because they want to frolic. Pigs and dolphins. I think, again, it comes back to finding work that we like.
• Ainsley: There was this tiny little thing that if we reward children for drawing even though it is terrible then they keep drawing. But if they don’t get rewarded then they kinda go ok, whatever, it was kind’ve a slog to begin with, I think I will just give this up. I think we should stop telling children that they are good at something when they are not. Maybe break it to them when they are old enough: Hey, you are terrible at painting. Let’s focus on something else.
• Dr. Littman: He says that he isn’t preaching motorcycle mechanics for everybody. But really he is preaching to find something which you derive satisfaction from and do that thing.
• Dr. Littman: In the next section he talks about how he doesn’t really like India, but he sees something electricians dealing with some cables and he feels some solidarity with them because he understands electrical work.
• Chloe: Basically by saying forcing yourself into isolation in order to gain greater understanding of something forces you further into isolation and will eventually cause you to feel a lack of community for something.
• Dr. Littman: Alright, to wrap up, this book is about the importance of deriving pleasure from work.
• Remember: Monday at 12:30, food and photo.

4/20 Class Notes

Guest Lecture: Nanometers to Motorcycles

Dr. Aditya Soods

• Extreme temperatures in the combustion chamber: gases can get at hot as ~2,200C.
• Leads to high temperatures in the engine block critical for: safety, mechanical integrity, comfort.
• In the nanoscale, atoms vibrate. These vibrations are oscillations which speed up as they get hotter.
• At room temperature, atoms vibrate at a frequency of about 1013 hz.
• ”Phonons”: really high frequency atomic vibrations that carry heat in electrical insulators.
• Bulk vs nanoscale heat conduction: Fourier’s Law is used to determine the thermal conductivity of materials.
• Fourier’s law breaks down for nanoscale materials.
• Heat changes the properties of materials. When you heat up a metal, fewer of the atoms are touching. With fewer boundaries which block the path of atomic planes, it is easier to mold the metal.
• Thermal barrier shields are a difficult engineering problem due to the fact that most thermal insulators are mechanically soft, with low mass density.
• An example that takes inspiration from acoustics is using multiple layers of different materials with varying densities to manipulate the oscillations of materials in the atomic scale.
• Materials scientists use something called 2-d materials to fabricate layers of atomic structures on the nanoscale, stacking various structures on top of each other to produce thin materials with desirable properties.
• Another application of thermoelectric materials is the generation of electricity using N- and P-type semiconductor pellets between two ceramic substrates and applying heat to one side of the material.
• A great application of these materials is in spacecraft and car manufacturing – ~70% of the energy produced in the engine is lost as heat. That heat could instead be converted to electrical energy for the car, saving another ~5% of energy.
• This type of technology can also be applied in reverse to create a thermoelectric cooler.

Recap

• Engine team: replaced valves
• Clutch team: troubleshooting to figure out why the red motorcycle is no longer igniting. Decided that it is a wiring program and is tracing wires using the electrical diagram to find the problem.
• Wheel team: Ordered new rim strips, inner tubes, and tiered. Measured the leather seats and watched YouTube tutorials to learn how to properly sew new leather seats for the blue motorcycle.
• Electrical team: Worked on the electrical switch and bored new threads into the switch.

On Wednesday, the class will be finishing the final chapters of the Shop class as soul craft book

Presentations should be 15 minutes long on May 7th at 12:30 pm. There should be some science in it, does not need to be comprehensive. We can give a brief overview of everything we did, however the technical piece should be about one specific aspect of something we worked on. We will also post our presentations on the website. 8-10 slides. Graphics.

Meeting on Monday, may 27th to take a group photo.