Engineering Quotes

“When you want to know how things really work, study them when they're coming apart.”
― William Gibson, Zero History

“But remember this, Japanese boy... airplanes are not tools for war. They are not for making money. Airplanes are beautiful dreams. Engineers turn dreams into reality.”
― Hayao Miyazaki, The Wind Rises

“When Henry Ford decided to produce his famous V-8 motor, he chose to build an engine with the entire eight cylinders cast in one block, and instructed his engineers to produce a design for the engine. The design was placed on paper, but the engineers agreed, to a man, that it was simply impossible to cast an eight-cylinder engine-block in one piece.

Ford replied,''Produce it anyway.”
― Henry Ford

“Engineers like to solve problems. If there are no problems handily available, they will create their own problems.”
― Scott Adams

“Anything which is physically possible can always be made financially possible; money is a bugaboo of small minds.”
― Robert A. Heinlein, The Moon Is a Harsh Mistress

“One man’s “magic” is another man’s engineering. “Supernatural” is a null word.”
― Robert Heinlein

“All we know about the new economic world tells us that nations which train engineers will prevail over those which train lawyers. No nation has ever sued its way to greatness. ”
― Richard Lamm

“We tend to hear much more about the splendors returned than the ships that brought them or the shipwrights. It has always been that way. Even those history books enamored of the voyages of Christopher Columbus do not tell much about the builders of the Nina the Pinta and the Santa Maria or about the principle of the caravel. These spacecraft their designers builders navigators and controllers are examples of what science and engineering set free for well-defined peaceful purposes can accomplish. Those scientists and engineers should be role models for an America seeking excellence and international competitiveness. They should be on our stamps.”
― Carl Sagan, Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space

“To those who know the speech of hills and rivers straightening a stream is like shipping vagrants—a very successful method of passing trouble from one place to the next. It solves nothing in any collective sense.”
― Aldo Leopold, For the Health of the Land: Previously Unpublished Essays And Other Writings

“The fewer moving parts, the better." "Exactly. No truer words were ever spoken in the context of engineering.”
― Christian Cantrell, Containment

“Manufacturing is more than just putting parts together. It's coming up with ideas, testing principles and perfecting the engineering, as well as final assembly.”
― James Dyson

“Incurable diseases will eventually
force mankind to justify
disruptive nanotech and genetic engineering.”
― Toba Beta [Betelgeuse Incident], Betelgeuse Incident: Insiden Bait Al-Jauza

“Kevyn, Ennesby tells me you are building a time machine.

Actually I'm finished.

In one afternoon? Wow... Does it work?

After a fashion.

...

I put a whole lot of energy into it, and the next thing I knew it was time for dinner.
-Captain Tagon & Commander Andreyasn”
― Howard Tayler, The Tub of Happiness

“Stephenson had large wrought-iron boiler plates available and he also had the courage of his calculations... The idea found its best-known expression in the Menai railway bridge opened in 1850. Stephenson's beams, which weighed 1,500 tons each, were built beside the Straits and were floated into position between the towers on rafts across a swirling tide. They were raised rather over a hundred feet up the towers by successive lifts with primitive hydraulic jacks. All this was not done without both apprehension and adventure; they were giants on the earth in those days.”
― J. E. Gordon, The New Science of Strong Materials: Or Why You Don't Fall through the Floor

“Automation is cost cutting by tightening the corners and not cutting them.”
― Haresh Sippy

“It is hardly surprising that the malodorous field of garbology has not attained the popularity of rocket science, oil exploration, or brain surgery.”
― Hans Y. Tammemagi, The Waste Crisis: Landfills, Incinerators, and the Search for a Sustainable Future

“As in real life, complex engineering designs demand a pragmatic approach.”
― Haresh Sippy

“In engineering, the joints are the most crucial. They have to be both firm and flexible, exactly like the joints in our body.”
― Haresh Sippy

“Worse than silicosis is silicon psychosis.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Humanovator (The Sonnet)

Chatgpt pampers plagiarism,
Facebook pampers conspiracy.
More and more innovations are
becoming catalyst of catastrophe.

Note, I didn't mention the birdie,
Very mindful, very demure.
Facebook can still be repaired,
but once a MAGA, always a sewer.

Innovation that outlives its usefulness,
is no longer innovation but carnivoration.
Innovators not in touch with soil-n-roots,
are predators of the concrete jungle.

The golden age of startups is behind us,
today it's mostly filth, fraud and smut.
Amidst the crowd of trust fund termites,
be the humanovator to humanize the world.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Divine Refugee

“Chatgpt pampers plagiarism,
Facebook pampers conspiracy.
More and more innovations are
becoming catalyst of catastrophe.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Divine Refugee

“More and more innovations are becoming catalyst of catastrophe.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Divine Refugee

“The golden age of startups is behind us,
today it's mostly filth, fraud and smut.
Amidst the crowd of trust fund termites,
be the humanovator to humanize the world.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Divine Refugee

“Innovation that outlives its usefulness,
is no longer innovation but carnivoration.
Innovators not in touch with soil-n-roots,
are predators of the concrete jungle.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Divine Refugee

“Silicon and Sapiens (The Sonnet)

Once upon a time,
I put down my soldering iron
and picked up the keyboard,
for I couldn't afford to sustain
my passion for electronics any more.

But now that I look back,
It was for the best.
The world has plenty tech genius,
what it lacks is reformer scientist.

My inside awareness of machine intricacies
has been an aid to my neuroscience.
In a world torn between mind and machine,
I bridge the shores of silicon and sapiens.

Biologists often diss the potential of machine,
just like gadgeteers are oblivious to life.
Life is a cosmic miracle, machines are a human one,
and with added purpose, machines could be
the mightiest defense of life.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Biologists often diss the potential of machine, just like gadgeteers are oblivious to life. Life is a cosmic miracle, machines are a human one, and with added purpose, machines could be the mightiest defense of life.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Life is a cosmic miracle, machines are a human one, and with added purpose, machines could be the mightiest defense of life.”
― Abhijit Naskar, World War Human: 100 New Earthling Sonnets

“Robo Sapiens (The Sonnet)

Artificial Intelligence could be
the greatest boon in accessibility,
yet AI enthusiasm is exhausted in
grotesque plagiarism and pomposity.

Tech giants of today suffer
from the worst kind of handicap
of all, lack of human perspective.
Till you treat this common coldness,
all innovation is mere fancy gimmick.

Innovation has power to lift the world,
yet it has become toys of privilege.
Cyborg souls sell cyborg machines,
beastly grotesque and senseless.

Once upon a time in the future,
robovans will carry robo-sapiens,
apes advanced in feats of silicon,
yet degraded in feats of sentience.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Humanitarian Dictator

“Once upon a time in the future,
robovans will carry robo-sapiens,
apes advanced in feats of silicon,
yet degraded in feats of sentience.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Humanitarian Dictator

“Tech giants of today suffer from the worst kind of handicap of all, lack of human perspective. Till you treat this common coldness, all innovation is mere fancy gimmick.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Humanitarian Dictator