Graphics Reference
In-Depth Information
3 Machines That Will Listen
This accident reminds us of the importance of the machines that listen, listen to the
operators or the users on site. No matter how smart designers or engineers may be,
they cannot foresee all the situations and they cannot prepare countermeasures for
all events.
What engineers have been doing up to now is how we can develop machines that
will speak. Our technology up to now is focused on speaking. Especially
mechanical engineers have been trying to build up the world of the arti
!
cial. If
workers do not work as they expect, mechanical engineers introduced robots to
replace them. And if the room humidity affects welding, they introduced air con-
ditioning in a factory. Mechanical products are arti
!
cial and mechanical engineers
have been trying to keep their operating conditions as arti
!
cial as possible. What
mechanical engineers have on their minds is how they can achieve the highest
quality. They often forget that we are living in nature, and their mechanical
products are operated by humans. Humans do not act as they are told. They would
like to do everything their way. And nature is unpredictable.
Interestingly enough, although it is called by the same name of engineering, civil
engineers work in a very different manner. Most of their structures are very few in
number or only one. And these structures are built and used in nature. Further, they
cannot be produced and assembled in a factory. Components may be produced in
factories, but
!
final structures have to be assembled on site, in a complete natural
world.
Thus, civil engineers do not simply pursue the highest level as mechanical
engineers, but rather they try to secure the acceptable bottom level, because many
unpredictable events happen when the structure is being constructed on site in
natural environment. Of course, they also pursue to achieve the highest, but they
know sometimes they have to compromise. Thus, civil engineers' model is adap-
tive, while mechanical engineers' is
!
xed.
Stewart Brand, known for his words, “Stay Hungry and Stay Foolish” and as the
editor of the Whole Earth Catalog [
2
], published an interesting book “How
do not live long, but those which were designed by less smart ones do live long,
because these building learn how to adapt to the changes. In other words, buildings
that only speak do not live long, while buildings that listen to the changes live much
and much longer.
Mechanical engineers have been too smart and have been trying to make the
world as arti
!
cial as much as possible, but we are living in a natural world. We have
to learn how to adapt to the changes in order to survive. Mechanical engineers'
approach has been successful up to now because our lifestyles were not so much
different from person to person and besides the areas we were living in were very
much limited and small. So the changes were very small and slow. But with the
rapid progress of technology, our world is expanding very quickly and our lifestyles
are diversifying extensively. Further, there are frequent and extensive changes
