Engineering Challenges Quotes

For me, as a woman in one of the less diverse fields - electrical engineering, which is what I studied in college - it was hard to persist and really build a career. Some of the things I experienced were really scary, and they weren't experiences that I wanted for my daughter.

It takes sixty-five thousand errors before you are qualified to make a rocket.

In software engineering, we have the term 'technical debt.' When you don't do a job correctly, unaddressed problems become harder and harder to solve.

Our problems are technical, not political

Most of our competitors were one-product wonders... They would do their one product, but never get their engineering sorted out.

Hyperloop is a decades-long effort. You're moving steel and reshaping physical things, so you need government to help you build.

I've always disliked words like inspiration. Writing is probably like a scientist thinking about some scientific problem, or an engineer about an engineering problem.

In the summer of 2002, we had spent six weeks shooting the three pilots of Mythbusters, and Jamie[Hyneman] called me up afterward - well, first he called me up to tell me to clear my crap back out of his shop - and he said, "Well, that was kind of fun, wasn't it? I mean, I don't see where this could go, because we pretty much did everything. But it was fun."

My first book, 'To Engineer Is Human,' was prompted by nonengineer friends asking me why so many technological accidents and failures were occurring. If engineers knew what they were doing, why did bridges and buildings fall down? It was a question that I had often asked myself, and I had no easy answer.

Software is definitely engineering. It's different in that we take on novel tasks every time. It's not like building a certain bridge that is virtually identical to some previous bridge or some previous building.

I recall a lecture by John Glenn, the first American to go into orbit. When asked what went through his mind while he was crouched in the rocket nose-cone, awaiting blast-off, he replied, "I was thinking that the rocket has 20,000 components, and each was made by the lowest bidder."

See... What I felt they should have done, for our first public works project, is build a giant wall... across the entire border of Canada. Because that's where the cold air comes from.

With whomsoever or wheresoever may rest the present causes of difficulty that apparently exist towards either the completion of the old engine, or the commencement of the new one, we trust they will not ultimately result in this generation's being acquainted with these inventions through the medium of pen, ink and paper merely; and still more do we hope, that for the honour of our country's reputation in the future pages of history, these causes will not lead to the completion of the undertaking by some other nation or government.

God help us we're in the hands of engineers.

The engineering, analytics, design, testing, and delivery behind our products offer some of the hardest engineering and business challenges in the world. As we've brought our franchises into eSports and moved to digital delivery, it's become even more complex and exciting - which, in turn, has allowed us attract even more top talent.

My objective is and has been for years to make the lightest and most compact flying machine that would carry me at 25 or 30 miles per hour for 10 minutes or a quarter of an hour. Current events show this is not at all an ambitious project. Want of an elementary knowledge of oil machines baulks me and causes much misdirected effort. I doubt my ability to acquire that knowledge, and feel like a fireman trying to hew out a donkey pump.

Designing a station with artificial gravity would undoubtedly be a daunting task. Space agencies would have to re-examine many reliable technologies under the light of the new forces these tools would have to endure. Space flight would have to take several steps back before moving forward again.

As you get older, you do reflect more. They were great times, but the biggest thing we all had to deal with a lot more disappointment from an engineering point of view, there was not the reliability that there is now.

I used to be a computer engineer, and I can make really good code, and we can make systems that work really well, and we can make the application a great experience, but when you have to translate bits to atoms, you need folks who are used to working with city governments, with state governments, and so I like to say we're in a political campaign.

Differential equations won't help you much in the design of aeroplanes - not yet, anyhow.

We were ignorant, and we were ignorant of the fact that we were ignorant. That is ignorance squared, and it can lead to disaster.

If it weren't for the people always getting tangled up with the machinery... Earth would be an engineer's paradise.

With the early prototypes, I held the phone to my ear and my ear [would] dial the number. You have to detect all sorts of ear-shapes and chin shapes, skin colour and hairdo... that was one of just many examples where we really thought, perhaps this isn’t going to work.

Despite the never-ending debate on the question of the role of government in America, there's been a strong tradition of protecting our undisputed, important natural treasures or taking on great common engineering challenges.

Engineering isn't about perfect solutions; it's about doing the best you can with limited resources.