In our recent appearance on
The National Geographic Doomsday Preppers
in critique of Ark Two -
"The Experts" said:
Russia and the US are working to reduce
the nuclear threat.
I am certainly not an expert -
but President John Fitzgerald Kennedy said:
”Ever since the longbow,
when man has developed new weapons
and stockpiled them,
somebody has come along and used them.
I don’t know how we can escape it
with nuclear weapons.”
The following is a true
although simultaneously
a somewhat tongue in cheek view
of the value of 'experts'.
"The bomb will never go off.
I speak as an expert in explosives."
-- Admiral William Leahy,
US Atomic Bomb Project.
"There is no likelihood man can ever
tap the power of the atom."
-- Robert Millikan,
Nobel Prize in Physics, 1923.
"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers."
-- Thomas Watson,
chairman of IBM, 1943.
"I have traveled the length
and breadth of this country
and talked with the best people
and I can assure you
that data processing is a fad
that won't last out the year."
--The editor in charge of business books
for Prentice Hall, 1957.
"But what is it good for?"
-- Engineer at the Advanced Computing Systems
Division of IBM, 1968,
commenting on the microchip
"640K ought to be enough for anybody."
-- Bill Gates, 1981
"This telephone has too many shortcomings
to be seriously considered
as a means of communication.
The device is inherently of no value to us."
-- Western Union internal memo, 1876
"The wireless music box
has no imaginable commercial value.
Who would pay for a message
sent to nobody in particular?"
-- David Sarnoff's associates
in response to his urgings for investment
in the radio in the 1920s
"The concept is interesting and well-formed,
but in order to earn better than a 'C,'
the idea must be feasible."
-- A Yale University management professor
in response to Fred Smith's paper
proposing reliable overnight delivery service.
(Smith went on to found
Federal Express Corp.)
"I'm just glad it'll be Clark Gable
who's falling on his face
and not Gary Cooper."
-- Gary Cooper on his decision
not to take the leading role in
"Gone with the Wind."
"A cookie store is a bad idea.
Besides, the market research reports say
America likes crispy cookies,
not soft and chewy cookies like you make."
-- Response to Debbi Fields' idea of
starting Mrs. Fields' Cookies.
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"Heavier-than-air flying machines
are impossible."
-- Lord Kelvin,
president, Royal Society, 1895.
"If I had thought about it,
I wouldn't have done the experiment.
The literature was full of examples
that said you can't do this."
-- Spencer Silver on the work
that led to the unique adhesives
for 3-M "Post-It" notepads
"Drill for oil?
You mean drill into the ground
to try and find oil?
You're crazy!"
-- Drillers who Edwin L. Drake
tried to enlist to his project
to drill for oil in 1859.
"Stocks have reached what looks like
a permanently high plateau."
-- Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics,
Yale University, 1929.
"Airplanes are interesting toys
but of no military value."
-- Marechal Ferdinand Foch,
Professor of Strategy,
Ecole Superieure de Guerre, France.
"Everything that can be invented has been invented."
-- Charles H. Duell,
Commissioner, US Office of Patents, 1899.
"The super computer is technologically
impossible.
It would take all of the water that flows
over Niagara Falls to cool the heat
generated by the number
of vacuum tubes required."
-- Professor of Electrical Engineering,
New York University.
"I don't know what use any one could find
for a machine that would make copies of documents.
It certainly couldn't be a feasible business
by itself."
-- the head of IBM,
refusing to back the idea,
forcing the inventor to found Xerox.
"Louis Pasteur's theory of germs
is ridiculous fiction."
-- Pierre Pachet, Professor of Physiology
at Toulouse, 1872.
"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain
will forever be shut
from the intrusion
of the wise and humane surgeon."
-- Sir John Eric Ericksen,
British surgeon,
appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary
to Queen Victoria 1873.
"There is no reason anyone would want
a computer in their home."
--Ken Olson, president,
chairman and founder of
Digital Equipment Corp., 1977.
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I certainly don't want to denigrate
the value of expertise.
In our highly technological world
we greatly rely upon it.
Nevertheless,
when you have listened to the 'experts'
you must still make up your own mind.
Sometimes your life may depend upon it.
Peace and love,
Bruce
DawnSayer@webpal.org
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