"Companies selling a product play down its vulnerability……" — Henry Petroski
"Companies selling a product play down its vulnerability and emphasize its robustness. But only after technology leaves the dock is it really tested. For human operators in control of a supposedly infallible system, complacency and overconfidence can take over, and caution may be thrown to the wind."
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Henry Petroski
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41 Quotes by Henry Petroski
Henry Petroski has 41 quotes on this site.
A few more worth reading:
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The most amazing achievement of the computer software industry is its continuing cancellation of the steady and staggering gains made…
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Engineers are not superhuman. They make mistakes in their assumptions, in their calculations, in their conclusions. That they make mistakes…
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Any design, whether its for a ship or an airplane, must be done in anticipation of potential failures.
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I emphasize that virtually every engineering calculation is ultimately a failure calculation, because without a failure criterion against which to…
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All conventional wisdom has an element of truth to it, but good design requires more than an element of truth…
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What is commonly overlooked in using the computer is the fact that the central goal of design is still to…
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A failed structure provides a counterexample to a hypothesis and shows us incontrovertibly what cannot be done, while a structure…
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Case studies of failure should be made a part of the vocabulary of every engineer so that he or she…
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There's so much written about the Titanic, and it's hard to separate what's fact and what's fiction. My understanding is…
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No one wants to learn from mistakes, but we cannot learn enough from successes to go beyond the state of…
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The paradox is that when we model future designs on past successes, we are inviting failure down the line; when…
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I have always been fascinated by the way things work and how they came to take the form that they…
See all 41 quotes by Henry Petroski »
More Caution Quotes
This quote is filed under Caution Quotes,
one of 354 quotes in that category. Here are a few more:
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Mystery creates wonder and wonder is the basis of man's desire to understand.
— Neil Armstrong
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Caution: These verses may be hazardous to your solemnity.
— Russell Baker
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If you wish to succeed in life, make perseverance your bosom friend, experience your wise counselor, caution your elder brother,…
— Joseph Addison
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Youth is the spirit of adventure and awakening. It is a time of physical emerging when the body attains the…
— Ezra Taft Benson
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The chief danger in life is that you may take too many precautions.
— Alfred Adler
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I have learned to use the word 'impossible' with the greatest caution.
— Wernher von Braun
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Every human being has, like Socrates, an attendant spirit; and wise are they who obey its signals. If it does…
— Lydia M. Child
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Some people like to live without too much risk. They're satisfied leading a safe existence. This attitude of caution infiltrates…
— Tom Platz
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When putting words together is good to do it with nicety and caution, your elegance and talent will be evident…
— Horace
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If the past is not resolved, future relationships will suffer. Let your heart heal, before you open the door to…
— Leon Brown
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If mankind is to profit freely from the small and sporadic crop of the heroically gifted it produces, it will…
— Wilfred Trotter
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Deliberate with caution, but act with decision and yield with graciousness, or oppose with firmness.
— Charles Caleb Colton
See all 354 Caution Quotes »