When Al Gore was the vice president, he created the Hammer Award to recognize people in the U.S. government who helped eliminate inefficiency and waste. The award consisted of a $6 hammer wrapped with a red, white, and blue ribbon, and mounted in a glass encased frame. Apparently the idea for the award came at least in part from the discovery that the U.S. Navy once paid $436 for a single hammer.
“To most outsiders, modern mathematics is unknown territory… a mass of indecipherable equations and incomprehensible concepts. Few realize that the world of modern mathematics is rich with vivid images and provocative ideas.”
— Ivars Peterson, Mathematical Association of America
“Oh no, it wasn’t the airplanes. It was beauty killed the beast.” — Robert Armstrong as
Carl Denham in the original King Kong (1933).
There’s a new movie in the making that will soon be playing in theatres and performing arts spaces everywhere. It’s about a new protocol that goes up against a monster bundle of cable. The winners in this battle are the techies and end users of large lighting systems.
“In art, truth and reality begin when one no longer understands what one is doing or what one knows, and when there remains an energy that is all the stronger for being constrained, controlled and compressed.” — Henri Matisse
“As a rock star, I have two instincts: I want to have fun and I want to change the world.” — Bono
On a recent late spring day, a rock star walked out on stage before a live audience of 5,500 very enthusiastic people. It was a big stage with a huge video backdrop framed by black soft goods that were splayed by parallel beams of white light. As the man in a black shirt, jeans and tennis shoes made his way downstage center, the house erupted in wild applause. And then he pitched the new Apple iPhone.
In North America, getting an occasional shock from a 120VAC household mains supply is almost a way of life for some of us. In Europe, getting shocked by their 230VAC or 240VAC is a good way to lose your life.
People usually consider walking on water or in thin air a miracle. But I think the real miracle is not to walk either on water or in thin air, but to walk on earth. Every day we are engaged in a miracle which we don’t even recognize: a blue sky, white clouds, green leaves, the black, curious eyes of a child — our own two eyes. All is a miracle.” — Thich Nhat Hanh
Suppose you owned a construction company and, along with it, some big, shiny dump trucks for hauling materials. Now suppose you’re constructing a building, starting from the foundation up. So you hire some drivers to haul sand from the sandufacturer (you know, the place where they manufacture sand) to the construction site so it can be mixed with some cement to pour the foundation.
“I believe in the imagination. What I cannot see is infinitely more important than what I can see.” — Duane Michals
I was surprised to learn that three out of five people think I can’t count, and the other three have no opinion. At least that was what I gathered from the e-mail after the article in this column about the five lighting metrics. Apparently the three lighting metrics that were covered in the article don’t account for all five.
Let me put this right up front: I’m not the brightest lamp on the truss. At times, I can make Jessica Simpson look like Marilyn vos Savant, who is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for five years under “Highest IQ” for both childhood and adult scores. I’m not particularly proud or embarrassed about that, but admitting it has served me well. An empty head can be like being an empty vessel looking for understanding with which to be filled.
“Science is but a perversion of itself unless it has as its ultimate goal the betterment of humanity.” – Nikola Tesla
“Do not worry about your difficulties in mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater.” – Albert Einstein
When it comes to math, Albert Einstein would have us believe that he’s no Einstein. Do you suppose he was exaggerating just a tad, or was he serious?
“As the circle of light increases, so does the circumference of darkness around it.” — Albert Einstein
I was fortunate enough to start in the lighting business when my own personal circumference of darkness was oh so small. I didn’t even know enough to know how little I knew. I was in the lighting business a long time before I stumbled across the secret to understanding the relationship between the five lighting metrics. It’s called ED-100.1.
“ED-100.1 Light & Color” is the first section in the Fundamental Level of the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America Lighting Education (www.iesna.org). The entire course is excellent, but if you do nothing else, read and understand pages 1-12 to 1-16 — the part that explains the five lighting metrics. You’ll learn in just a few minutes what it took me years to find out: The five lighting metrics hold the key to understanding all you need to know about lighting.