Bloodhound supercar is 'recession beater', says promoter

Government plans to turn the UK's foundering financial-services-based economy into a high tech, engineering powerhouse were showcased today in London. The "Pioneers 09" expo was opened by Richard Noble, the man in charge of the new Bloodhound supersonic car project. However, there was also news of an even more inspiring …

[Paul]

I've said it before

and ill say it again... Want more people in tech? Train them. Don't just refuse anyone without a an MEng, 1 years work placement and a final project and thisis based on what your company dose... Simple realy. Invest in people and you will see your company grow.

[Anonymous Coward]

Jokes aside

Actually "A significant amount of research has been done on what motivates students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. The literature shows it is particularly important to demonstrate the social relevance of the topic and its interesting applications if one wishes to attract women and under-represented minorities." (this is taken from a survey paper in Acoustics Today).

Personally, I don't think much of it (nor did the few women colleagues I've asked), but who knows -- maybe news items such as the mammography one would prove to be a boost to women participation.

[Anonymous Coward]

world's fastest mathematician..

I think you'll find it was stated as the fastest mathematician ON Earth! at least it was when I saw the video... Which is correct as he is the LAND SPEED record holder no-one has been faster...

[Anonymous Coward]

when did i miss THAT meeting??

You can actually get a job 'finding out what happens to boobs when you squeeze them and then let them go'. Am I the only one wondering where you have to go to get a job being a scientist in the UK?

Hello I'd like to give bees cocaine can I have a grant and some cocaine. No, already done, well er how about testing the effects of compression on boobs? Thats done too, hmmmm well how about testing the effects of canabaliods underwater on invertibrates?

Paris as I'd test the compression of her breasts

[Paul]

a nation's gotta make stuff

Interesting to to hear a major British engineer like Noble, despite being contingent on investment, having the guts to observe the nonsensical quality of our having run down our manufacturing base under both Tory and Labour governments. We powerless plebs long thought it could not be right, but were pursuaded when finer minds than ours told us we didn't understand economics and that our great leap forward into becoming a nation of media and financial services was better for us all and not just a channel to private wealth for the few. Now it transpires that we had a point, Fred the Shred and his ilk are off to the Caribbean as fast as poss, and the media and financial sectors are in a feet-of-clay meltdown. Now it turns out money is just a promissory note after all, there's really no satisfaction in having been right.

[Anonymous Coward]

Stealing from Science

"The spin-out companies concerned are now part of Siemens, to the gratification of all hands (cough)."

Since there's at least one piece of "intellectual property" featured on the site of the "technology transfer" operation at Oxford which looks suspiciously like a software patent, I guess British innovation is very much like innovation elsewhere: awarding illegitimate monopolies from the public purse.

http://www.isis-innovation.com/licensing/1229.html

http://www.isis-innovation.com/licensing/2536.html

[Sam]

Really?

"universal use of LEDs in place of incandescent or fluorescent lights would cut the national 'leccy bill by 15 per cent."

Going to question that, I thought the savings would be higher.

Anyone?

[Dave Harris]

a couple of points

"The spin-out companies concerned are now part of Siemens,"

<snurgle>

sixth l;argest manufacturing sector in the world? Seriously? Measured on what? Total output compared to other nations (counts), total output compared to other nations per capita (doesn't count), or compared to other nations as a percentage of GNP (doesn't count)?

Source, please.

No icon, 'cos I don't reckon Paris' are big enough to be included in trials

[Matt W]

@Sam

Lumens per watt is highest from those sodium lamps. LED's are not as efficient.

For everyone though the key question is, who gets paid more ? A graduate accountant, or a graduate engineer ? Even that Kay bloke from Oxford got his degree in Chemistry, but is infact, working one of the Big 4 Accounting firms in Reading. There's a reason for that.

[Eddie]

@when did i miss THAT meeting??

One of my chemistry teachers at school got his doctorate researching the stabilty of d9-tetrahydracannabinol* - he had a license to grow up to 32oz per year (this was in the 60s, when weights were real) - which, as he phrased it "wasn't bad, since we only needed 50g (2oz) for our research"

Alas though, as source of grow tips he was less useful than my biology teacher who showed us which of the constituents of budgie seed** were cannabis seeds.

*(no delta symbol on my keyboard, and I'm not sure of the spelling...)

** Which may go some ways to explain James Hunt's hobby

[Eric Dennis]

Huh?

Not getting the connection between building a land speed vehicle and squeezing breasts to model "what happens when you let go of them". I'd say that the resulting affect of breast squeezing is nipple erection and arousal/stimulation. I'll have to do some "research" to confirm this, however. LOL!!!!

Paris, as she can always volunteer to assist with my "research", especially considering that it appears that she got a boob job and I've heard that the bewbies are "less sensitive" following this procedure.

[Anonymous Coward]

Quite right Lewis ..

I don't think one can be too cynical about the puffery associated with the supersonic car project.

UK engineering is short of investment - in projects, research, facilities and infrastructure. Investment would drive innovation, and with that would come the bright engineers and scientists, and dare I say it .. profits. Sadly in every respect the UK is becoming ever more short-term.

I know the supersonic car is a great bit of tech, but in what sense is it engineering? It has been done before - how will it develop new technology, which is both neccesary, and could be exploited either for its own sake, or for profits? In what way will it generate the employment that will attract new blood? it seems more like a nostalgic trip down memory lane!

[Anonymous Coward]

I still don't understand why we should be saving energy on interior lighting...

Most of the year in the UK we spend money heating the structures we live and work in.

The "inefficiency" of conventional tungsten lighting is given out as heat.

So why are we worrying about efficient lighting for interior spaces? If we were talking about Australia, where aircon is a significant energy consumer I could understand it; but in the UK we need to heat interior spaces 90% of the time.

Lightbulbs are particularly handy as heaters because most people turn them on when they're in the room, and turn them off when they leave; if anything it could make more sense to make them *less* efficient and give out even more heat.

Obviously the situation for exterior lighting is different; energy efficiency does make sense there.

As for why engineering and science are underwhelming the current generation; which would most teenagers rather be:

a) An internationally reknowned footballer, or...

b) an internationally reknowned engineer?

Let's see, who gets the fame? Footballer. Money? Footballer again. Poor job security, wow finally the engineer makes the league table; understandably it's a somewhat pyrrhic victory though ;)

[Anonymous Coward]

@Eric Dennis

Mans progress has always been built on the faint possibility of a shag !

Squeezing mammaries has a faint connotation to the above, so possibly extrapolating to the possibility of a shag. Which may lead to progress.

Now as discussed above, Science, Engineering, Accounting or other ? Now I would argue that each holds roughly the same possibility of a shag, and therefore roughly the same contribution to mans progress. However, I would have to say that none of these 'fields of research' would on it's own not achieve much. You need the Accountants to keep the business focused on making money. You need the Scientists and Engineers doing research and turning this into money making reality. Other careers need to support these objectives.

It follows that for a company to be successful contented and happy Accounting, Engineering and Scientific staff are a necessity. These staff must feel that there is a chance of a shag to be productive.

Human remains (HR) departments nationwide need to pay attention to this productivity requirement.

[Anonymous Coward]

keeping abreast with science

Ok, quitting now and going for a little lie down.

[Etienne]

Want more engineers and scientists?

PAY THEM MORE... people aspired to be bankers, not for the job but for the rewards.

You'll always get the engineering "starving artists" who do it for the love of the subject but if you want more normal people to aspire to be engineers then you must pay more for performing that role... otherwise they'll take their strong analytical skills and become accountants or bankers.

Small pay checks don't buy nice cars and nice houses and don't get you a good looking girlfriend/boy friend... and guess what most teenager care about!

[Anonymous Coward]

How about...

some joined-up thinking here... ?

In the UK there are 420,000 women qualified to degree level or above in science and engineering who do not have jobs. (Source: ESRC data). Their skills cover everything from science graduates, post-grads through to doctorate mathematicians and physicists.

Life sciences and IT are especially difficult to get back into after any sort of career break for women.

With a) appropriate investment and b) a really good kicking to every one of the bigoted, sexist and ageist recruit-tards who think motherhood comes with a lobotomy, YOU KNOW WHO YOU ARE! then a proportion of these would be able to meet this shortfall in skills and be economically and scientifically productive.

It would also go a long way to solving the other problem as well.

The white lab coat please....

[Andy Bright]

re: Want more engineers and scientists?

Most industries don't share our government's feigned concern about the lack of engineers and scientists in western countries. That's because there's a steady supply of cheap labour from any number of Asian and eastern European countries, all of whom have educations that match or exceed our own and for whom a wage 1/10th of ours represents a small fortune in some of their economies.

The good news is that's not a situation that can last forever. Eventually we'll become the cheap labour and we'll be manning the call centers for them.