#Mechanization

[noosphe-re]

We live in a world that has become mechanized to an amazingly high degree. Irrational unconscious phenomena are always a threat to this mechanization. Poets may be delightful creatures in the meadow or the garret, but they are menaces on the assembly line. Mechanization requires uniformity, predictability, and orderliness; and the very fact that unconscious phenomena are original and irrational is already an inevitable threat to bourgeois order and uniformity.

Rollo May, The Courage to Create

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

“The first steelmaking corporations, of course, had done more than simply change individual work processes. They had brought most of them together in huge sprawling complexes that tightly linked each phase of production with the others. Individual departments and processes within departments nonetheless retained some distinctive rhythms and occupational requirements. Some processes were normally continuous, notably the coke ovens, blast furnaces, and open-hearth, while others, especially the smaller rolling mills, were based on batch production. Some, like blast furnaces and rolling mills, required steady, routinized feeding of furnaces or machinery, while others required more erratic bursts of frantic exertion, especially tapping furnaces. There was, in short, a great variety of work in a steel plant that did not necessarily lead to a common occupational experience for the industry's workers.  

In many ways, the sum of all the technological innovations was greater than its parts. Besides the changes in individual stages of production, it was the thorough integration of the plants that was so remarkable. Every plant was a maze of tracks for numerous railways, cranes, and conveyers. Raw materials moved along these to coke ovens and blast furnaces; liquid pig iron was swept off to the open-hearths at the end of giant cranes; steel ingots were shunted off to the rolling mills, where cranes and conveyors carried the steel forward. In contrast to past practices, there was far less remelting and reheating of the metal as it moved through the plants. Early twentieth-century steelmaking did not involve an assembly line, but there was definitely an integrated flow-through. For the most part, moreover, the plants ran continuously throughout the year, rather than on the seasonal basis that had characterized much nineteenth-century production. In fact, several departments ran non-stop twenty-four hours a day and seven days a week. Mechanization therefore brought not only greater volume of production from the new facilities, but also greater speed and intensity and, for the workers, greater pressure to keep up. ... Most contemporary reports nonetheless emphasized how the Canadian steel industry, like its American counterpart, had been transformed by the machine. The Journal of Commerce's editor, A.R.R. Jones, applied the label "gigantic automaton" to the "typical all-round Canadian steel plant" that he visited (clearly Stelco's Hamilton plant), in which "the labor in every branch of the industry consists mainly in the supervision and maintenance of machinery." What was missing from these glowing descriptions of mechanization was what the steelworkers who worked with this new technology every day had discovered. It was remarkably dangerous. The intense heat from furnaces alone could inspire fear, but the showers of sparks from ladles of molten metal could actually sear the flesh of nearby workers. Photographs of steel production from these early years indicate how little protective clothing or equipment was used. The noise could be similarly fearsome. One man described how on his first day in Algoma's plant he could not hear a train that he suddenly discovered was passing inches from his back. Not surprisingly, an American writer found that many of the steelworkers he met had hearing problems. If the men were not dodging locomotives or machines whose tracks criss-crossed the plants, they were scampering out of the way of ladles, moulds, and great hunks of glowing steel that soared through the air at the end of giant cranes. For one Stelco worker, the first day on the job was "like entering another world." For another man at Algoma, this mechanized work world seemed like "organized confusion." Stress would inevitably become a new occupational hazard in such a fearsome workplace.”

- Craig Heron, Working in Steel: The Early Years in Canada, 1883-1935 (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1988), p. 48-49.

[nogig6]

esc does this every time she undergoes maintenance

every technician in the fleet, devoted to their faith, refuses to perform maintenance on her.  

[tenth-sentence]

Nor could women farmers easily raise capital to buy new agricultural machines.

"Normal Women: 900 Years of Making History" - Philippa Gregory

[sigrid-of-solstheim]

Fanfiction writers be like:

"here's the immensely time consuming 100K word novel-length passion project I'm working on between my real life job and family! It eats up hundreds of hours of my one and only life, causes me emotional harm, and I gain basically nothing from it! Also I put it on the internet for free so anyone can read if they want. Hope you love it!" :)

[bronkdoes-stuff]

Me when the story that obviously isn’t going to have a happy ending doesn’t have a happy ending

[adobe-outdesign]

the craziest beta 'mon is this guy, who would evolve into a random Pokemon upon evolution

like imagine finding this autism creature fighting for its life out in the wild so you catch it out of pity and two months later it evolves into goddamn Rayquaza

[patchwork-crow-writes]

Y'all ever think about the way video game bosses are designed to lose? How the bombastic soundtracks, the impressive displays of villainy, the teeth-rattling power of their attacks, are at once engineered not just to sell you on how unfathomably strong and vile they are, but also to make the player's inevitable victory all the sweeter?

Viewed this way, a boss battle is more like a choreographed dance - they call, you respond and counter-call. The trick is to learn the steps - once you know where to move, when to strike, when to defend and how to best allocate your resources, victory is not just achievable but actually almost impossible to avoid. You cannot help but recite the winning plays, over and again, because that is what the dance demands of you both - and is there not a savage sort of beauty in such a thing?

Is it any wonder then that we look back on these bosses so fondly, almost as if they were old friends? We danced together once, and oh what fun we had while doing it!

[rae-butter]

Honestly, I love it when characters relapse. When someone who’s gotten over their anger issues falls into a situation so out of their depth they fall back on their old habits. When someone who’s learned to open up becomes a recluse again in order to cope with something outside their control.

There’s just something so horrible, so toxic, about watching a character grow and then slip back into their old selves in order to cope, bc you know they still care, that they’re the same inside, but watching them hurt so hard they don’t know what else to do brings a sense of catharsis.

[if-you-fan-a-fire]

“Technocracy Will Rebuild World,” Vancouver Sun. December 10, 1932. Page 1 & 2. --- 4-HOUR DAY; 4-Day Week; 660 HRS. A YEAR ---- SOCIAL CHANGES URGENT ---- NORTH AMERICA'S GREAT CHANCE --- MORE AMAZING REVELATIONS OF 'THE DAWN OF A NEW ERA' ==== Technocracy declares that North America is equipped today to lead the world into a new era.  

"Where man for the first time in his progression from the jungle is the conqueror in the battle for leisure." 

Here are its sweeping and tremendous conclusions, as told by Wayne W. Parrish, writing in Alfred E. Smith's magazine, New Outlook. 

"Man, in his age-long struggle for leisure and the elimination of toil, has finally arrived at that position where, for the first time, this goal is not only possible, but probable. 

"With what is known of technology today in this country, it is now necessary for the adult population, ages 25 to 45, to work but 660 hours per year per individual to produce a standard of living for the entire population ten timer above the average income of 1929."

The downward decline since the fall of 1929 has never once abated, and Technocracy has predicted in no uncertain terms the greatest social wreck of all time unless this decline is halted, or controlled. It is simply the example of an ox-cart driver attempting to pilot an airplane. There is little time to learn to use the controls to avert a crash.

This is no plea for 'social justice,' no scheme for a Utopian realization of the humble rights of all men. It is a necessity. For the first time, in history, as a result of the technological advance we have achieved an economy of plenty in the midst of a hodge-podge of debt and unemployment.  The plain fact is that the machine and men cannot both work on a rarity basis any longer. The machine has pushed man out of work. There isn't room for him any more. Instead of being a cause for remorse this should he the most joyful proclamation in history. Let the machine do man's work for him. Let him have leisure. Of course the entire social structure must be changed. Why not?  But again, it is not a matter of choice. Technology has brought our present system to its doom. There is no way out except by fundamental revision. 

Certain it is that the impact of technology on our price system has proved the futility in the future of stocks, bonds, savings, equities, mortgages and all concomitants of our past system. 

This is no mere "business cycle." Technocracy maintains that America is at the close of an era, and the actual ending is dependent only upon the length of time artificial stimulants can be injected. At the best, the time is short. The day of reckoning is growing nearer every week. 

While employment has been decreasing the U. S. has increased its debt load to above $218,000,000,000 by shoving present responsibilities off to the future. 

Technocracy (energy survey of North. America) is an integration of physics, chemistry, geology, geophysics, thermo-dynamics, zoology, biophysics, biology and physiology. 

At the present downward rate we will have 25,000,000 unemployed by 1934.

Technocracy's yardstick, applied to North America, reveals that communism, facism, socialism and other political systems are entirely inadequate to cope with the needs of a new state of civilization.

WHERE IT BEGAN Technocracy began in 1918 with the study by a group of engineers of the advance in machine production during the war. Technocracy foresaw the present unemployment of 14,-000,000 in North America, and foresaw the depression which would accentuate unemployment. 

Technocracy began as a study, but it has become "the logical expression for a technological energy state." 

It has, says Parrish, earned its place in the history of the human race along with democracy and autocracy. Here in broad terms is the definition: 

AUTOCRACY Rule by the individual. DEMOCRACY Rule by the people. TECHNOCRACY Rule by skill or science. It is a tremendous picture Parrish draws. And here are some of the arresting statements in his dynamic and stirring story of "the end of an era." 

Here, in the words of Parrish, is how the machine, "the really big technological mechanism that makes entire industries automatic, has changed the whole face of the social complex. 

It has now made possible, and necessary, the elimination of much of man's toil.

It has made invalid every old social, political and economic postulate now in use. 

It has rendered political systems useless. 

It has sounded the death knell of old methods of exchange. 

It has shelved permanently the necessity for private enterprise and savings. 

It has made sterile the moral concepts of the virtue of labor. 

By the pervasive force in changing man's whole outlook upon life, it has opened the way for the greatest release of the no-called human values in history,

It has provided the way for the elimination of individual greed and the enjoyment of leisure by everyone.

Today, says Parrish, the members if Technocracy number 350 and are located in all parts of the world. Only during the last month, the number of otherwise unemployed draughtsmen -and engineers who are doing the research and plotting hundreds of charts has been raised from thirty-six to one hundred. 

They are being paid by the Architects' Emergency Relief Committee of New York, and are housed at Columbia by Professor Walter Rautenstrach, who is a member of Technocracy. 

INTO THE NEW ERA Man will, as usual, have to adjust himself to the new era, he cannot refute it for long, argues Parrish. 

At no previous time, on no other continent, has there existed such a peculiar complex of energy and natural resources as exist on the North American continent. In the words of Howard Scott: 

"It is the only continental area of the world's surface manned, equipped and ready to move civilization into the new era where man for the first time in his progression from weakness to conqueror in the battle for leisure.' 

"This is no plea for "social justice," no scheme for Utopian realization of the humble rights of all men. It is a necessity.

"For the first time in history as a result of the technological advance we have achieved an economy of plenty in the midst of a hodgepodge of debt and unemployment. 

"The plain fact is that the machine and men cannot both work on a parity basis any longer. The machine has pushed men out of work. There isn’t room for him any more. Instead of being a cause for remorse this should be the most joyful proclamation in history. Let the machine do man's work for him. Let him have leisure. Of course the entire social structure must be changed. Why not? 

"But again, it is not a matter of choice. Technocracy has brought our present system to its doom. There is no way out except by fundamental revision. 

WHY NORTH AMERICA LEADS Then, in a swift survey of the world, Parrish tells why he regards North America as the continent to lead the world out of the old and into the new. And he emphasizes that he speaks of. North America in an economic sense, with no Canada and U. S. boundary involved. He says: 

"Russia, with its much-vaunted Communism, is but a slight variation of the American price system when placed under an exacting light. With 92% of its population tillers of the soil, with meagre technical facilities and "more musicians than technologists," as Mr. Scott expresses it, Russia found itself in the position of being compelled to inaugurate an industrial era under a Communistic price system of production with insufficiently developed energy resources and inadequate personnel." 

'VALIANT BATTLE' "From the viewpoint of Technocracy, England is fighting a valiant but losing battle. Among the futile gestures which probably will be made will be complete, abandonment of monetary currency and current banking credit, and stringent preferential tariffs and purchasing agreements to lessen the disparity which exists in its international balance of world trade."

"Fascist Italy is in much the same situation. It possesses insufficient water power and almost no Iron, copper, coal, oil and gas, but is offering bonuses to further increase its already dangerous population overload.

"Fascism –“ a last ditch defense of a price system against the oncoming army ef social change," is only able to maintain itself temporarily in Italy by the importations of foreign materials and energy resources for which it is still able to pay. 

"Of other nations or continents little needs to be said. Asia is hopeless as far as a high energy civilization is concerned. There aren't the resources available. You can't take more coal out of the ground than is actually there. 

"Australia has very few resources. It has almost no opportunity for further development. 

"South America is greatly lacking in many essential resources. 

"If all Europe were combined into one unified energy state, a high standard of living could be obtained for all the peoples there, but language and nationalism, present almost insurmountable barriers at present.” 

"Japan has attempted to operate a highly mechanized society under great handicaps. With limited resources and a high population density, she is reaching out to Manchuria for aid, but there is little there to help her. LONG LIFE PRODUCTS Here are some things Parrish cites as the potential products of technology, which show the necessity of control: 

Razor blades which would last a lifetime... 

Ramie plant which would outwear and outserve wool or cotton. 

An automobile that would go 300,000 miles without an overhaul. 

Shoes that would wear two and a half years without repair. 

"If the comparatively new fibrous nettle plant, ramie, is introduced to industry (and eventually it will be) the entire wood pulp, silk, wool and cotton industries would be very seriously affected. “Ramie has a 22-inch fibre, can be raised 1,500 pounds to the acre (compared to 450 pounds of cotton) and two or three crops can be obtained in a year in the southern states. There is no problem of pick ng, since it can be cut and bound with a thresher. 

"If made into two suits, it wears seven times as well as wool, and several hundred times better than cotton. It has the advantageous property of being stronger when wet than dry. It can be made into paper cheaper than wood pulp and the paper can't be torn by the human hand. It has a lustre similar to silk and linen, can be woven with silk and rayon or wool and cotton, and takes dyes beautifully." 

"The technologist is able to produce an automobile that would really be of service. Designs are all complete for a machine that would have a Hickman or a boat-type bottom. Individual wheel suspension, exposed steel parts that would not rust, frictionless bearings throughout, and would have an average life of 300,000 to 350,000 miles without a general overhauling." 

SHOES  2/12 YEARS "Shoes? It's the same story over again. The technologists can produce leather today that is waterproof and has a wearing quality that would make an average pair of shoes wear two and a half years. But our shoe industry, running way under capacity as it is, could supply the nation with a ten years' supply of these shoes within a period of eight or ten months. Believe it or not, the shoe industry has a capacity of 900,000,000 shoes per year. Where is the market?" 

MANLESS MACHINES And his answer to public works, such as highways, to provide work: 

"A machine Is already developed and waiting for a public works market that, with two men operating It per shift, or six men for each twenty-four hours, can tear up an old road or street, lay foundations for pavement, and put on the pavement sixty-feet wide, at the rate of eight miles a day!" 

"Keep such developments out? It is impossible under the price system, for a primary requisite of a price system is that production costs be cut, and more efficient machinery. Is the best way to cut costs. 

"A factory for the production of rayon yarn is nearing completion in New Jersey. Its operation is entirely mechanical and production can be carried on without a single worker in the plant. By means of photo-electric cells it will be possible for an official In New York to change dyes without leaving his desk and without human assistance at the plant. 

"The technological advance of thirty years has now made. It possible for a man to eliminate much of his toil. In doing so it has doomed the entrepreneur and the entire system of selling for price.

"Egypt Assyria, Greece, and Rome led the world in their days. "The past is thick with Empires dust." A new continent is able to take its position in the leadership of the civilization of tomorrow. "Technocracy poses that question."

What Technocracy Means Technocracy has literally burst upon the world. It is the rule of skill or science, the fixing of a higher plane of living, made possible by technology and the machine. 

Boys and girls, with their life ahead of them, will read it with an absorbing Interest. It is their hope. 

Men and women will see it as the outcome of the condition which they helped to create, and to which the world can now fit itself. 

Thousands of copies have been distributed, in compact form, of previous interpretative articles and editorials from The Vancouver Sun on Technocracy. Thousands more have been minted and are available at The Sun Office for all who wish them. Editor. 

[fuckyeahchinesefashion]

How did ancient Chinese tombs set up mechanisms to deter tomb robbers? (This is just a basic demonstration - in reality, it was far more complex. The mausoleums of Qin Shi Huang (259-210 BCE) and Empress Wu Zetian (624-705 CE) remain unexcavated to this day because current technology cannot safely handle them.) Cnetizen say "No excavation needed - mercury level testing suffices. The Records of the Grand Historian documents that the First Emperor's underground palace used mercury to simulate rivers and seas. Being highly volatile, the mercury would have largely dissipated over time - not just since Xiang Yu's era 2,200 years ago, but even if Huang Chao's rebels had breached it 1,000 years later. Yet modern instruments detect severely elevated mercury levels at the site!" This confirms the mausoleum has never been substantially breached. While we cannot rule out that a few tomb raiders ('touching gold captains') may have entered, none could have survived - the instant mercury vapor exposure would have been fatal." Qin Shi Huang is revered as the 'Ancestral Dragon' in China, so people never joke about him - it’s believed to bring bad luck (a superstition tied to disrespecting the 'Dragon Emperor'). This might also explain why no one has dared to open his mausoleum to this day.

[tenth-sentence]

High wages (that is, a high cost of labor) created a strong incentive to find mechanical alternatives to replace or amplify human labor, and England's coal beds provided the fuel.

"Plagues Upon the Earth: Disease and the Course of Human History" - Kyle Harper

[crumb-crumblet-s-crumbington]

guys is it weird for your 20 year old son to build your ex husband out of trash in your house after youve gotten divorced

[ghosted-jazz]

THE QUEEN!! SHES BACK!!!!!!

[artifacts-and-arthropods]

Yellowjacket-Mimicking Moth: this is just a harmless moth that mimics the appearance and behavior of a yellowjacket/wasp; its disguise is so convincing that it can even fool actual wasps

This species (Myrmecopsis polistes) may be one of the most impressive wasp-mimics in the world. The moth's narrow waist, teardrop-shaped abdomen, black-and-yellow patterning, transparent wings, smooth appearance, and folded wing position all mimic the features of a wasp. Unlike an actual wasp, however, it does not have any mandibles or biting/chewing mouthparts, because it's equipped with a proboscis instead, and it has noticeably "feathery" antennae.

There are many moths that use hymenopteran mimicry (the mimicry of bees, wasps, yellowjackets, hornets, and/or bumblebees, in particular) as a way to deter predators, and those mimics are often incredibly convincing. Myrmecopsis polistes is one of the best examples, but there are several other moths that have also mastered this form of mimicry.

Above: Pseudosphex laticincta, another moth species that mimics a yellowjacket

These disguises often involve more than just a physical resemblance; in many cases, the moths also engage in behavioral and/or acoustic mimicry, meaning that they can mimic the sounds and behaviors of their hymenopteran models. In some cases, the resemblance is so convincing that it even fools actual wasps/yellowjackets.

Above: Pseudosphex laticincta

Such a detailed and intricate disguise is unusual even among mimics. Researchers believe that it developed partly as a way for the moth to trick actual wasps into treating it like one of their own. Wasps frequently prey upon moths, but they are innately non-aggressive toward their own fellow nest-mates, which are identified by sight -- so if the moth can convincingly impersonate one of those nest-mates, then it can avoid being eaten by wasps.

Above: Pseudosphex laticincta

I gave an overview of the moths that mimic bees, wasps, yellowjackets, hornets, and bumblebees in one of my previous posts, but I felt that these two species (Myrmecopsis polistes and Pseudosphex laticincta) deserved to have their own dedicated post, because these are two of the most convincing mimics I have ever seen.

Above: Pseudosphex sp.

I think that moths in general are probably the most talented mimics in the natural world. They have so many intricate, unique disguises, and they often combine visual, behavioral, and acoustic forms of mimicry in order to produce an uncanny resemblance.

Several of these incredible mimics have already been featured on my blog: moths that mimic jumping spiders, a moth that mimics a broken birch twig, a moth caterpillar that can mimic a snake, a moth that disguises itself as two flies feeding on a pile of bird droppings, a moth that mimics a dried-up leaf, a moth that can mimic a cuckoo bee, and a moth that mimics the leaves of a poplar tree.

Moths are just so much more interesting than people generally realize.

Sources & More Info:

Journal of Ecology and Evolution: A Hypothesis to Explain Accuracy of Wasp Resemblances

Entomology Today: In Enemy Garb: A New Explanation for Wasp Mimicry

iNaturalist: Myrmecopsis polistes and Pseudosphex laticincta

Transactions of the Entomological Society of London: A Few Observations on Mimicry