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But our bridges and infrastructure are crumbling

That’s not for lack of engineering talent! We just don’t like paying for boring things like… bridges that haven’t collapsed yet. “Call us when it does crumble. We’ve got a border wall to build or gender reassignment surgeries for prisoners to pay for.”

What a cheap shot. “gender reassignment surgeries for prisoners” - cos there are soooo many of those happening we can’t fix a single bridge.

How about another explanation. Your government is totally opposed to helping citizens for “free” (let’s ignore that most government revenue comes from good ol’ taxpayers) when the alternative is to farm out the provision of expensive services to lobbying corporates.

They’re more than happy to punish people however. For free _and_ for corporate profit.


Both parties spend money on ridiculous things that are obviously wastes of money. Are any lies detected?

reference needed


Those are issues of priority and revenue generation, not capability.

Soon we won't have the capabilities. See the nuclear industry and how we don't have the people and training to do the work anymore.

There are 342 million people here. We'll be fine.

I used to think this too. Now I know different.

It reminds me of this Steve Jobs Clip:

https://youtu.be/0lvMgMrNDlg?si=QkkOnngYTjaSPlIy

He said, so many years ago, that there will become a time where computing power is so prevalent that we will stop using the person to make the computers job easier and start using the computer to make the humans job of interfacing with it easier.

But in this context, it would mean the other side of increase productivity is decreased time to do the same work. These are the same thing.


There are really only 2 choices.

There is a third, Embrarer. They have most of the market in small regional jets in some cases, but those are in reality very different than say a 777 or 787.

These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers. In short Boeing, Airbus and it's suppliers are basically what is left of all the old big aerospace manufacturers.


Indeed. Embraer (Brazil) does jetliners carrying up to around 150 pax. So did Bombardier (Canada), though they sold their C-Series to Airbus (now the Airbus A220). Then there's COMAC (China) and UAC (Russia; also a conglomerate of Sukhoi, Tupolev, etc.).

These compete with the smaller versions of the Airbus A320 family (like the discontinued A318 "Baby Bus") or Boeing B737 family.

So, in that narrow-body and regional jet segment there are a few players.

But in the big wide-body (=2 aisles) long-range jets, there's only Airbus and Boeing.


Another manufacturer of regional aircraft with a significant market share is ATR, though it makes turboprop airliners, so not exactly the same category as Airbus A220 and Embraer E-Jet.

>There are really only 2 choices.

For private jets there are Gulfstream, Bombardier, Textron, Dassault, and as you said Embraer. I think there was a recent new Entry, Honda from Japan.


For private jets, in order of most to least deliveries per year (number per year in parenthesis): Cessna (171) Gulfstream (158) Bombardier (157) Embraer (155) Cirrus (106) Dassult (37) Honda (12)

Which is nothing compared to: 737 (447) 767 (30) 777 (35) 787 (88)


These two choices are conglomerates of what used to be a much larger set of manufacturers

This. The entire market has been allowed to be monopolized through mergers and buy-outs. Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened.


>Russia used to have their own aerospace industry (and that fleet was reliable enough to be allowed to fly in Europe) but then Russia happened.

It's absolutely irrelevant what Russia did or could have done here in this industry.

Same with Chinese planes. If they ever manage to make a competitive passenger plane, it will not be allowed certification by US and European authorities purely for political reasons, the same way how their EVs are not allowed for sale in the US or how they aren't allowed to have ASML EUV machines. This isn't a fair game, never was.

The decisions on purchase of aerospace units is 90% (inter-)national politics and only 10% meritocracy, since both Boeing and Airbus are massive defense players making advanced killing machines, and no country wants to directly or indirectly fund the defense industry of their geopolitical rivals.

When a third country needs to chooses between Airbus or Boeing for their flag carrier fleet, they don't objectively compare the operational history and tech specs of Airbus vs Boeing and make the decision based on that, they just ask themselves "do I want to be in bed with EU-France or with Uncle Sam as my main ally and provider for the next 30+ years". Hence why most oil-rich middle eastern states chose Boeing as the US is their main defense provider anyway and don't want to anger them, especially when Donald Orange makes a visit to your state.

That's just how politics works when you operate at that level. Handshakes, dinners and bribes. Always has.


Emirates, Qatar, and Etihad all seem to have fleets that are approximately 50/50 between Boeing and Airbus though.

Sensible.

There was a waymo just parked for days I noticed recently in SF. 2 or 3 days it was just in the same parking spot (4 hr max) with it's lidar spinning.


Hands down one of the best TV shows ever made


This is amazing. If you've ever held a fountain pen with this finish you know.


And the salmon


That's how we used to do it back on the day


Yes! The most amazing part about those things was they achieved all those axis' of motion with one or two motors.


And the associated grinding noises were kinda scary but damn if the thing didn't hold up.


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