This reminds me of an episode of Mythbusters where the crew set up a bunch of of MacGyver puzzles for the two hosts—pick a lock with a lightbulb filament, develop film with common household chemicals, and signal a helicopter with a tent and camping supplies.
In all seriousness though, Philisophical Materialism and the Scientific Method are probably the most important things; three years ago I bought my first car for a pack of cigarettes, and a $20 Hayes manual. At the time I didn’t even know what an alternator was; three months later I’d diagnosed a major electrical problem, and performed an engine swap. The manual helped (obviously), but for the most part it was the knowledge that any mechanical device could be reduced to simple causal patterns which allowed me to do this (incidentally, this is a hobby that I strongly recommend to other LW members—you get to put the scientific method into practice in a hands-on manner, and at the end of it you get a car which is slightly less crappy).
I tend to think that the mere knowledge that flying machines are possible will allow the survivors of WWIII to redevelop the prewar tech within a century.
I tried this with one of my first cars back in the early 90s. It turns out that there are a very large number of things that can go wrong with essentially every step of repairing a car, and I didn’t have the money or time to continue replacing parts I’d destroyed or troubleshooting problems I’d caused while trying to fix another problem.
I like programming because it has the same features of tracking down problems, but almost entirely without the autocommit feature of physical reality, as long as you choose to back up and test.
Also, even in the 90s, a computer was far cheaper than a good set of tools.
Could you explain Philosophical Materialism and the Scientific Method without first having the read do science? I agree that these might be the most important things but it isn’t clear to me how they can be explained to a civilization that lacks a general scientific vocabulary or the context to interpret things like falsifiability, hypotheses, ontological fundamental mental entities, etc. Does the most important lesson have to be toward the end of the book?
incidentally, this is a hobby that I strongly recommend to other LW members—you get to put the scientific method into practice in a hands-on manner, and at the end of it you get a car which is slightly less crappy.
Does the same principle apply to motorcycle maintenance? :-)
A book I was reading that suggested doing your own minor auto repairs, warned strongly against doing motorcycle repairs for anything after the late 1970s. He claimed that newer cycles were so tightly integrated and the tools for working on them so specialized, that you were too likely to get something taken apart that you literally could not reassemble.
I’d say that’s true for modern supersports and superbikes, but a beginner bike like a Kawasaki Ninja EX-250 has very little in the way of electrics or other tightly-integrated mechanisms. Just as an anecdote: I do regular maintenance on my 2006 SV-650/S, but anything more complicated than oil changes on my 1972 Honda CB350 is done by a mechanic. While newer bikes have complicated parts like ECUs and fuel injection, those are usually the most reliable parts. Repairing older motorcycles typically involves scrounging e-bay for parts that are no longer manufactured.
The thing I like most about motorcycles is that they are simple, so it’s pretty easy to diagnose any problems. It only takes a minute to tell if you’re running lean or rich. Simply starting, hearing, and smelling an engine can tell you whether you just need new piston rings or if you’ve damaged the crankshaft journal bearings.
If you really want the most mechanically simple vehicle, I’d suggest an old scooter such as a Honda Cub. The set of failure modes for an air-cooled single-cylinder engine is quite small.
This reminds me of an episode of Mythbusters where the crew set up a bunch of of MacGyver puzzles for the two hosts—pick a lock with a lightbulb filament, develop film with common household chemicals, and signal a helicopter with a tent and camping supplies.
In all seriousness though, Philisophical Materialism and the Scientific Method are probably the most important things; three years ago I bought my first car for a pack of cigarettes, and a $20 Hayes manual. At the time I didn’t even know what an alternator was; three months later I’d diagnosed a major electrical problem, and performed an engine swap. The manual helped (obviously), but for the most part it was the knowledge that any mechanical device could be reduced to simple causal patterns which allowed me to do this (incidentally, this is a hobby that I strongly recommend to other LW members—you get to put the scientific method into practice in a hands-on manner, and at the end of it you get a car which is slightly less crappy).
I tend to think that the mere knowledge that flying machines are possible will allow the survivors of WWIII to redevelop the prewar tech within a century.
I tried this with one of my first cars back in the early 90s. It turns out that there are a very large number of things that can go wrong with essentially every step of repairing a car, and I didn’t have the money or time to continue replacing parts I’d destroyed or troubleshooting problems I’d caused while trying to fix another problem.
I like programming because it has the same features of tracking down problems, but almost entirely without the autocommit feature of physical reality, as long as you choose to back up and test.
Also, even in the 90s, a computer was far cheaper than a good set of tools.
Could you explain Philosophical Materialism and the Scientific Method without first having the read do science? I agree that these might be the most important things but it isn’t clear to me how they can be explained to a civilization that lacks a general scientific vocabulary or the context to interpret things like falsifiability, hypotheses, ontological fundamental mental entities, etc. Does the most important lesson have to be toward the end of the book?
Does the same principle apply to motorcycle maintenance? :-)
A book I was reading that suggested doing your own minor auto repairs, warned strongly against doing motorcycle repairs for anything after the late 1970s. He claimed that newer cycles were so tightly integrated and the tools for working on them so specialized, that you were too likely to get something taken apart that you literally could not reassemble.
I’d say that’s true for modern supersports and superbikes, but a beginner bike like a Kawasaki Ninja EX-250 has very little in the way of electrics or other tightly-integrated mechanisms. Just as an anecdote: I do regular maintenance on my 2006 SV-650/S, but anything more complicated than oil changes on my 1972 Honda CB350 is done by a mechanic. While newer bikes have complicated parts like ECUs and fuel injection, those are usually the most reliable parts. Repairing older motorcycles typically involves scrounging e-bay for parts that are no longer manufactured.
The thing I like most about motorcycles is that they are simple, so it’s pretty easy to diagnose any problems. It only takes a minute to tell if you’re running lean or rich. Simply starting, hearing, and smelling an engine can tell you whether you just need new piston rings or if you’ve damaged the crankshaft journal bearings.
If you really want the most mechanically simple vehicle, I’d suggest an old scooter such as a Honda Cub. The set of failure modes for an air-cooled single-cylinder engine is quite small.