Lockheed Martin puts out a Fusion Related Press Release

Araysar_sl said:

Right now you can only put a slide ruler into your chest.

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This is actually what happened in IM3, but he needed the 8 year old kid with the computers/calculators to actually power his suit.

If math is all about the numbers, and a slide rule is a tool used to fux with those numbers, then isn't a calculator a battery powered slide rule?

A new opponent takes to the arena. Smart phone wins, fatality.

Abefroman_sl said:

Did they use a slide rule when landing a spacecraft on Mars?

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No but if they had the climate orbiter probably wouldn't have crashed. The thing about computers and calculators is they are GIGO - we've come to trust the numbers. Whereas with a slide rule (as pointed out in the NPR audio) you get a better feel for whether the answer you just got is right or way off.

Raising the stakes:

This guy argues calculators are obsolete (replaced by PCs for all practical purposes).

Slide rules | The Endeavour

Sabbat_sl said:

If math is all about the numbers, and a slide rule is a tool used to fux with those numbers, then isn't a calculator a battery powered slide rule?

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Cook's answer (and I would go further):

I?d recommend using a slide rule in high school for the same reason as using an abacus in elementary school: because it?s tangible, not because it?s practical.

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Elaborating: as I've mentioned before, unlike a calculator (scientific or otherwise) a slide rule actually encourages you to "play with it". You can not explore/play with a calculator the way you can with a slide rule.

NT

tad10_sl said:

Not a calculator that's got to be some kind of computer algebra system -

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I edited it before you posted, Smartphone.

Lithose_sl said:

I edited it before you posted, Smartphone.

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But it has to be running ontop of some kind of mini-CAS. In any event rational laziness is winning the day.

@Sabbat I want to wax philosophical about slide rules for a second - and I'm paraphrasing someone who I can't find on the web right now - not my idea originally, but I agree with whomever I am paraphrasing.

The logarithmic slide rule representation of the number line (go see one of the videos or online or see a jpeg above), is a physical manifestation of how we as humans perceive numbers. If you look at the C/D scale you'll see that the numbers from 1 to 2 have twice the gradations as from 2 to 4 and five times the gradations as from 4 to 10.

When the average human thinks of numbers he thinks of 1-19 as close, 20-40 or 50 as middling and numbers beyond 50 as very far. Indeed the English language represents our thinking with unique numbers for 1-20 (one, two, eleven, twelve) and from 20 on up, all numbers except for the beginning of a decade (twenty/thirty) are of similar non-unique forms (twenty-one, fifty-one). The only unique number missing from the C/D scales is zero - which also ties into human psychology regarding math: zero was a very late concept.

Somehow I have the feeling that Tad sells Slide rules for a living.

After reading a little more, this seems to be very interesting Lockheed making the vessel smaller seems like a good idea for testing, instead of that ITER mess in France..