KISS
 

KISS

I am thinking that sometimes the basic principles of common sense are very often underestimated. Very intelligent people seem to be capable of very unintelligent decisions eg :

1. Charge of the Light Brigade- horses against guns!!

2. WW1 - infantry against machine guns !!

3. Space travel - billions spent - achievement ???

4. Vietnam - why fight with one arm tied??

5. Typhoon - a great fighter ac but a bomber??

6. Aircraft carriers -too expensive and too vulnerable!

7. MOD - too big !

8. Gulf war 2 - no end game /wrong enemy ??

9. Arab spring ???

10. BREXIT - don't procrastinate just go for it!

11. Russia - talk !

12. United Nations - waste of time ??

13. House of Lords - too big !!

14. Corbyn - disaster!

15. Political correctness - gone far too far !!

16. Health Service - too big !

17. Rich to poor pay gap - way too big !

18 . RAF - top-heavy !

19. Annual budgets - stupid !!

20. Wind turbines ??

Could go on but would welcome comment from the intelligentsia !






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Bad day at the office?

And breathe...
Can't fault No18 though.

Twenty interesting thoughts. One very big assumption...

There are legions of counter arguments. Take NHS, I have just had major surgery but in the 5 weeks was treated or attended by, at a guess, 6 doctors and over 30 nurses and assistants with others unseen such as pathology, histology, etc. The whole was seamlessly integrated and I would not have wanted fewer.

The number of clinical staff in different departments need non clinical support with receptionists in each department, ward managers, bed managers, catering, logistics etc etc.

I would rather too many than LEAN or JIT.

If you're not narrowing it to manned, GPS satellites for example, those would seem to have some impact on modern life.

The Apollo program led to the development of microprocessors & there is also a theory that it resulted in the end of the Cold War - America's success in the race to the Moon led the Soviets to believe that they were technologically capable of almost anything so when Reagan began the Star Wars program they believed it would also succeed and realised they couldn't compete, financially or technologically.

The pictures of the Earth brought back from the first missions to the Moon arguably led to the nascent conservation movement as it was the first time Man saw our planet for what it was, a tiny oasis in space.

The entire cost of Apollo from 1961 - 1972 was less than one year of spending on the Vietnam war (at its peak), every dollar spent on advanced science & engineering here on Earth, it wasn't just money packed into rockets & blasted off into space. The spinoffs from this technology has helped to transform modern life.

The USA's Skylab project conducted science & Earth observation from low orbit, just one deposit of copper it discovered was valued at more than the entire program.

I could go on!!

I agree with the rest of your list though.

Placing a camera next to a A330 Voyager joystick springs to mind!

Ken - a good defence?.
PN - congrats on your NHS experience - hope that you are having a full and speedy recovery. However the basic facts remain that everyone is living longer and new drugs are so expensive that funding in its present format just won't work! Root reform is needed ASAP - it is time to bite the bullet and get on with it! In any enormous operation millions seem to disappear down the cracks!

a few more!

21. The EU! Why not just EFTA?

22. The EURO - doesn't work!

23. Immigration - without proper control.

24 RU - offside laws!

25. Golf - obscure rules / EGU handicapping system!

26. Soccer - why no video replay?

27. Formula One - boring!

Over - - -

Alternatively...perhaps many (maybe all) of the issues you raise are in reality complex and difficult challenges in which those involved hold a vast range of different views and opinions depending on how their lives and futures are affected.

Or maybe the world has just been waiting for all these issues to be raised on an internet bulletin board that can solve them instantly. Was Jet Blast full?

MB, TY, apart from drugs it is more costly procedures. Mrs PN is a retired nurse and was surprised at the amount of personal or disposable equipment used. Each patient had a personal blood pressure cuff. Thermometers had one use only disposable tips. Even pills were supplied in a small once only cup. Everything that could be once only use was so, apart from water beakers and jugs. Item cost will have been in pence but grossed up, add in purchasing staff and supply chain and costs will mount. That is the price regarding cross infection control.

I agree on the aspect regarding aging population.

really?
you won't think so if it's your life on the line, or that of your son or daughter.

When was the last time an aircraft carrier was damaged in battle? 1945? Granted we have not had a major blue water peer conflict, but carriers seem to have come in handy over the last 75 years in conflict large and small. As for expensive, it is only too expensive if you can't afford it. A Ferrari is to expensive for me, but maybe not the next guy.


UN. Perhaps more talk than action, but would prefer that there is no international body? I think it is good to have a forum.

aah, but infection control is key to patient survival. Interestingly, having been in both UK and French hospitals, give me the latter for cleanliness and infection control, but things may have improved in UK since last visit

Yes it is.
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/u...-against-daesh

Money well spent on space programme after all we got non stick frying pans out of it. Just think how many Brillo pads we would have got through without the invention.

Fantastic work - congrats to all involved - a great shame that more of this info doesn't appear regularly in the national press!

It could be that this works out cheaper than paying people to collect all the different items, and then sterilise them to the required level.

I don't have the source handy, but I read that every dollar spent on the Apollo program resulted in a net benefit to the US economy of 7 dollars. It's not like the money disappears; it buys you skilled jobs, expertise, infrastructure, education, exportable technology etc, and keeps circulating round the economy; all those skilled workers are spending their increased earnings on goods, services etc, which pays more people's wages and so on. The question isn't whether or not you should spend the money, but whether you'll get even better returns by spending it on something else.

Pasta, that of course is possible, but to take two, BP cuffs and thermometers were used patient to patient with the latter simply dipped in a cleaner. If you are of an age you may remember the glass mercury thermometer in a slim metal case. Long thin bulb under the tongue or short bulb at the other end and always a danger of a mouth full of mercury and broken glass.

As someone who was diagnosed with aggressive cancer last June you would have great difficulty in persuading me there is anything wrong with the NHS. Fantastic service. Every ward I was on was cleaned extremely well every day.

Chemotherapy is awful but it seems to work.

ACW

Actually teflon was invented in the 1950s & whilst used by NASA for rocket nose cones etc it was not invented by them. But Pasta is correct, the benefits of Apollo far outweighed the costs, even if you ignore the sheer achievement of putting men on the Moon.