People will only believe what they want to believe. No more, and
usually a lot less.
From C.S.Y2K 01/19/1998; thanks to Brian Duvaul
This story will sound familiar to most of you.
'..... What was the response?
As he leaves my cave, "Well, I'll leave you to save the world."
AAAARRRRRRRGGGGG'
Regards,
John
-------------
Tonight my sister-in-law and her husband dropped off their kids (it
takes a village) for us to watch while they went to the movies. They
both work for the government. (it takes a village) She is a civil
engineer for the local municipality and he is a wildlife biologist for
the BLM.
When they came in, I was sitting in my cave (home office, spare
bedroon) logged onto the comp.software.year-2000. My bruder-in-law
came in while the wives talked. (he really is a nice guy)
"What are you doing."
"Checking out the latest posts on the year 2000 newsgroup. These are the people who are actually working on the problem."
Doing some quick thinking on exactly what post he would believe, I
grabbed the one that quoted a New York Times article. He looked at the first screen full of text:
> Year 2000 Raises Safety Risk for Air Traffic Computers
>
> By MATTHEW L. WALD
>
> ASHINGTON -- A set of crucial computers in the
> nation's air traffic control system should not be
> used beyond December 1999, because they may not operate
> reliably when the date rolls over to Jan. 1, 2000, and
> there is no way to predict the effect on air traffic,
> according to IBM, which built the computers.
Mild interest shown.
"Isn't that just about mainframes?"
I just happened to have auxilliary tank fuel pump controller that I
assemble. It has two IC's on it that I burn in on a PC and solder to
the boards. These go on general aviation aircraft, not commercial.
Read: real, live embedded system staring him in the face.
I tell him, "these chips don't utalize the date function, but they are
very time sensitive." (they time the fuel being transferred, they have
software controlled delays to account for fuel slosh, etc.) "The
electronic engineer who designed this system got these chips, 'off the shelf.' That is, they still have the date function, but it is not
accessed by the burned-in software. This date function *may* make the chip fail after y2k. And, there is no way to test them. You can't 'set the clock ahead.' The clock is in the chip."
The response: "hmmm"
Side note: these controllers don't do anything important. It's not
like they control pumps that transfer fuel between the auxilliary
tanks and the primary tanks. It's not like the primary tanks feed the
engine. It's not like the engine is dependant on fuel to keep it
running. It's not like the propeller is dependant on the engine to
keep it turning. It's not like the wings are dependent on the
propeller to generate thrust. It's not like PLANES WILL AUGER IN
WITHOUT FUEL!
So what do we have here?
A highly-educated person (Master's degree) who is absolutely
confronted with the following facts:
1. The people who are actually working on the problem discussing the ramifications.
2. The "New York Times" reporting the problem.
3. An, in your face, example of the embedded chip problem.
What was the response?
As he leaves my cave, "Well, I'll leave you to save the world."
AAAARRRRRRRGGGGG
The one good thing: he recognizes that the world need saving as long as I am feeding him the right info. Another version: "if what you are saying is right, the world may be in deep doo-doo, but I don't want to believe it"
I honestly don't know how to present more credible sources.
People will only believe what they want to believe. No more, and
usually a lot less. |
