
Architects have a lot to learn from the sound engineering of the ancients - dnetesn
http://nautil.us/issue/24/error/why-we-should-let-the-pantheon-crack
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yiyus
This MIT professor looks like a very intelligent guy, and I agree with what he
says, but the article shows that the reporter did not understand some things.

Plasticity theory is presented as an alternative to the finite element method,
but in fact they are usually used together. While plasticity theory explains
how materials deform, the FE method makes possible to apply this theory to
complex structures.

In any case, the problem cannot be FEM, but how it is applied and how the
results are interpreted. It is very likely (even expected) that applying the
requirements used for steel or concrete structures to the Pantheon will give
you wrong results, but that does not mean FEM is the problem. Blindly doing
simulations without having a good model and being very careful of how boundary
conditions are applied and how to interpret the results, on the other hand, is
becoming a greater problem as the necessary hardware becomes more affordable.

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waivek
As a software "engineer", I've always been envious of architects and the well-
defined path to mastery that exists in their field. You start off as a lowly
apprentice and only through years of study and practice can you progress.

As a result, the best architects in the world are generally forty and above
and there is a correlation between age and competence. There is no 22 year old
rockstar architect. The bar of competence is so high that six months of
concentrated effort is simply not sufficient for an outsider to become a
professional architect.

~~~
vtange
I'm a software engineer that went through architecture school and I think
you're glorifying architects a bit here.

The only reason why architects have a more gradual path as you describe is
because there is a LOT of gatekeeping and feedback on your work is a LOT
slower.

To become an architect you have to ideally go through schooling at a specific
set of schools and then after that you have years of internships where you are
at the mercy of the architect who supervises you. If you end up with a not-so-
friendly boss you could end up working years of your youth in an unpaid
internship and end up NOT getting any credit. That's years of delay to
licensure. After getting enough credit and hours you still to take multiple
exams, paying out of your own pocket, to get licensed. And unlike software,
aspiring architects cannot spend a weekend or two to build projects on their
own to put on a portfolio of work, and problems from anything you design can
take months or years to crop up.

And even after all that only a tiny minority of architects end up in firms
like SOM (like Google but for architects) and get to work in glamourous
projects. The vast majority of architects just work on run-of-the-mill housing
(not unlike CRUD apps) where the combination of building codes, the client's
budget, zoning and other requirements often prevents you from doing anything
too flashy.

The great thing about software really is the fact you have the independence
and ability to build and publicize your own stuff whereas in all the other
formal professions you can't without oversight.

~~~
starpilot
> The vast majority of architects just work on run-of-the-mill housing (not
> unlike CRUD apps) where the combination of building codes, the client's
> budget, zoning and other requirements often prevents you from doing anything
> too flashy.

In talking with civil, naval, and mechanical engineers that I know, this type
of "crank out another one similar to the last one" work seems to be the norm.
I used to be aerospace and thought it was just my company. New part designed,
do the same type of analysis and write it up and send it to the FAA, they
rubber stamp it. But it's remarkably similar in many fields. The civil guy I
know says for every new road/bridge they review it's just the same shit over
and over. It's just a white collar assembly line everywhere. It reduces errors
and is efficient as a division of labor, but it's not very fun.

~~~
itronitron
>> "crank out another one similar to the last one"

That's because they can't stand up a micro-service or API to crank those
things out.

~~~
Latteland
that should be your startup idea! "automate that boring civil engineering
design with the agi 5000".

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tim333
I found it interesting wandering around the ancient sites in Egypt to see what
survived 4000 years. Granite was the easy winner followed by heaped structures
of softer rocks.

~~~
travisjungroth
The problem with that for architecture is most structures are meant to be
occupied, and being inside a heaped structure of softer rocks isn't very nice.
I do wish that I got to see a structure meant to last millennia built in my
lifetime. On that timescale, I _just_ missed Mount Rushmore.

~~~
briga
Considering how many structures from thousands of years ago are still around,
I'd be shocked if there weren't any 21st-century buildings standing thousands
of years from now.

~~~
Someone
Rebar makes buildings a lot stronger, but also has the unfortunate property of
rusting. That makes it less strong and expands it, damaging other parts of the
structure. It also is more or less everywhere.

Also, modern buildings often are designed for a given economical lifetime. If
you order a structure that can be maintained for 50 years at $1M a year,
that’s what you will get. You likely can keep it standing for centuries, but
at ever-increasing maintenance costs.

On the other hand, we are building so much that, statistically, something will
be standing thousands of years from now.

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shen
The article title is confusing architects with structural engineers.

~~~
ska
On the other hand, some architects could stand to learn quite a bit from
structural engineers...

~~~
jaclaz
>On the other hand, some architects could stand to learn quite a bit from
structural engineers...

... and viceversa.

As said above as I see it the real issue is the (modern)
separation/specialization of those professions.

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KingMob
The Lindy Effect in action again. People should always seriously study things
that have survived a long time, instead of downplaying them due to neophilia.

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natmaka
Isn't part of this talent gained thru motivation, in turn judged necessary as
they had "skin in the game"?
[https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/18558/were-
roma...](https://skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/18558/were-roman-
engineers-required-to-stand-beneath-their-bridges-as-they-were-tested)

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booleandilemma
I hope one day they say the same thing about us programmers of the present
time.

Hello from 2018 and sorry about JavaScript!

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pgnas
The megaliths of Bolivia and structures all over the world which man could not
replicate prove this. It would seem that the more we turn our back on the
natural world and our history, the more we hold ourselves back from break
throughs in many areas.

~~~
rafiki6
Who says we can't replicate them? It's just not economical to do so and really
serves no purpose. The world has generally moved past projects with
superstitious/dubious meaning attached to them and does an actual cost/benefit
on most large scale endeavors. Except for some developing countries with
growing economies who have something to prove.

~~~
erikpukinskis
You are correct we probably can today. The biggest prehistoric megalith blocks
are somewhere in the neighborhood of 1,500 tons, perfectly milled. The modern
record for the largest structure lifted by crane is 20,000 tons. So we have an
order of magnitude capability on be ancients.

However what is certainly true is that there was a long period in between
where we couldn’t. From at least 1000 BC to sometime in the 1900s AD it
would’ve been physically impossible to recreate Baalbek. Yet somehow thousands
of years before that ancient people did it.

My pet theory is they used compound reed boats, canals, and locks to do it.
But in the end we don’t know.

What’s clear is there were people more similar to us than we are to the
Elizabethans in terms of technological capability, and they were totally wiped
out. No stories, other than myths, no pottery, no metals, nothing left of them
except the most durable giant stone remnants.

In other words: the up and to the right trajectory of history is wrong. There
are bigger cycles in civilization than all of history combined can illuminate.

~~~
ghthor
I think we will find proof if we start digging into the flood deltas and the
near shore oceans depths. The floods at the beginning and end of the younger
dryas washed over most, if not all of the earths land mass, in a catastrophic
way. Then the sea rises, burying the washed out remains of civilization under
a few hundred feet of saltwater. If were going to find anything, I think it
will be there. That's my hypothesis anyway.

~~~
erikpukinskis
Good idea.

