Thursday 22 December 2016

Tulip Mania



The Tulip Mania was een economic bubble in in the trade of tulip bulbs in and around the town of Harlem in Holland in the seventeenth century.

Tulip bulbs and purchase options on tulip bulbs became as expensive as a series of houses along the main street. The Tulip Mania reached its peak when the exchange course of the tulip bulb crashed on the 3rd of February 1637.

People tend to claim this was unexpected - not true. A citizen of the town of Hoorn wrote a clear warning “Claere ontdeckingh der dwaesheydt” ("clear discovery of folly") . Today we have the paintings of Jan Bruegel the younger and of Hendrik Gerritszoon Pot as testimonies. you can admire both paintings in the Frans Hals museum in Harlem.

Such collective folly is, sadly, very recognisable. The question is, however, why man behaves like a herd beast. One rich neighbour is usually convincing enough to try it. Even worse, it is the one who doesn't participate in the folly who is declared mad. It is worth considering what else is today's collective madness? You are kindly invited to name a few as a comment to this blog.

Anyhow, the behaviour of masses is unreliable. Never follow a mass without criticism. This must have been the birth of Socrates' wisdom.

I refer to my blog: "Senatores boni viri" and to my Dutch blogs: ”De Waanzin van het Intellect” and “Lof der Zotheid”.

Picture: Tulip Mania - Jan Bruegel the younger

Tuesday 13 December 2016

Gute Technik ist immer schön


Good technology is always beautiful” is a maxim from Claude Dornier, the founding father  of the Dornier aircraft industry in and around Friedrichshafen at the lake of Konstanz. The sentence reveals some important truths.

The first truth is about ‘good’ technology. It needs to be reliable and simple. And in simplicity we can often recognise a certain beauty.

The second truth is about beauty. We look for beauty in art. Sometimes, we also see beauty in nature and even in science. But there is certainly a lot of beauty to be discovered in technology. As technology education is often very demanding and time-consuming, very few teachers take the time to uncover this beauty in class. And this is a pity, because good technology is often very beautiful, as Claude Dornier said. We need more teachers who point to this beauty. And we need more boys and girls who recognise this beauty and who want to build more.

I refer to my previous blog about the beauty of the engineering profession.

Picture was taken with permission at DLR in Oberpfaffenhofen.

Sunday 4 December 2016

The Engineer’s Courageous Mastery


On December 4th, the engineering faculty at KU Leuven celebrates Saint Barbara, the patroness of the engineers. After my graduation, I discovered that the old mine region around Esch-sur-Alzette and Dudelange in Luxembourg (the so-called Minette) also celebrates Sainte Barbe on this day, as she is also the protectress of the miners. So it is a good day to reflect on the nature of the engineering profession.

The older I get, the more I realise what a privilege it is to be an engineer. Like all professions, it is a vocation and a suffering at the same time. Let me start with the drawbacks: the relative absence of the female gender, the difficult education and the relatively hard work (on average). The good things are: the education is wonderful; you get an insight into the wonderful working of so many things, that you become about capable of understanding almost anything else (except fiscal declaration forms and fiscal calculations – Einstein said he couldn’t understand them either; let that be our comfort). And last but not least, engineers have a constructive role; they contribute in many ways to the value creation in economy and to the general well-being.

When you get older, you realise also that the daily life of an engineer is rarely filled with differential equations. It is rather filled with attempts to master chaos. On this picture, made by Jan van Eyck, you can actually see the engineer at work. Behind Barbara’s back, you can see the chaotic wharf of a cathedral in construction. The engineer gives instructions to a man on top of the tower who is heaving a load of stones upward by means of a crane driven by men in the tower. In the lonely landscape, a group of noblemen is approaching the cathedral to see how things are going  😊.

In the 21st century, engineers don’t build cathedrals anymore (except in Catalonia). We now build satellite communication and satellite navigation systems. But we still need to manage chaos. Let us hope Saint Barbara will stay with us.

Inspiration came from an article by Eric Rinckhout in Davidsfonds Cultuurmagazine.