Sexism in engineering language

[Andrew Johnston]

On Andrew Johnston Said:

On Hollowpoint Said:

I don’t want to be rude to your friend but how can he/she be both non-binary and transgender? If you don’t identify with either gender how can you then transition from one to the other?

The whole area of gender, as opposed to biological sex, is complex and adapts as attitudes change. Even biological sex not simple, as there are intersex people who can have physical characteristics associated with both biological sexes.

At one time transgender was generally taken to mean those who had transitioned from their birth sex to the opposite sex. It is now usually taken to cover anyone who isn’t cis, ie, who identifies with their biological birth sex. So it is now covers non-binary.

As I understand it from Julie she is biologically male but has never really felt particularly comfortable with that. However, she has learnt to cope and from a practical viewpoint within society it is often easier to wear the male persona. She is much happier as a female and switches when she can. So she is non-binary in that her gender is fluid and she presents as male or female as needed.

Hope that makes sense!

Andrew

“At one time transgender was generally taken to mean those who had transitioned from their birth sex to the opposite sex. It is now usually taken to cover anyone who isn’t cis, ie, who identifies with their biological birth sex. So it is now covers non-binary.”

Ok that’s fine. So your friend is “non-binary” which can be encompassed by the word transgender.

Again, I don’t see the need to alter language with a million new words.

[Kiwi Bloke]

On Kiwi Bloke Said:

…

It is OK, if you’re woke, to place someone into an identity category – say white, privileged, male member of the repressive colonial patriarchy – declare that such a group is unacceptable, and ‘cancel’ them. Because they claim you are a member of that unacceptable group, you have no say. Free speech is cancelled..

 

I can’t think of a single instance when that has happened. Plenty of people have been “cancelled” over things things they have said or done, none that I recall over who they are, pale, stale male or whatever.

[RainbowsParticipant @rainbows]

As a nudge back to the original most practical part of the original question –

In power connectors we mostly know male as the plug and female as the socket.

Powercon & Truecon fairly often confuses people because the plug lives in a recessed shroud to make it look like a socket. Alternatively source and drain are physically the same shape just differentiated by colour and different key orientation.

Powerlock, on account of being indistinguishable by sex due to its design, is called drain and source.

So you’re all too late engineering has already been transed. Male and female gets called internal and external taper/thread/dingdong which isn’t a new thing as far as I can tell.

 

But anyhow we’re in engineering here, the year will be 2424, the earth is a desert, human kind has shed it’s physical bodies and sexes to become a digital gestalt consciousness. The spaceship warp drive industry is being criticised for somehow still having a gender pay gap

[JAParticipant @ja]

Beatrice Shilling raced her Norton at Brooklands. Really no need for a front brake unless refueling was needed.

The problem with Merlin carburettors was not running inverted but a momentary lack of fuel when going unverted. The escape monoeovre of a chased ME109 was to suddenly put the nose down and enter a steep dive. As soon as the Spitfire did the same to follow, there was a big cough from the its engine. As for flying inverted, that was being done before WW1. Orifice was not the only name used.

JA

[HopperParticipant @hopper]

Indeed, now I think of it, I remember Biggles flying his Sopwith Camel upside-down in WW1 or so. I knew there was something about that with the Spitfires but could not remember so I added the “etc” after inverted. Thanks for clarifying.

[Anonymous]

The actual problem solved by the small brass washer was that the Merlin carburettor flooded under temporary negative ‘g’.

Andrew

[Anonymous]

Never mind male and female, hermaphroditic connectors are available; that is a connector that mates with itself.

Andrew

[Michael Gilligan]

On Michael Gilligan Said:

Does Julie get to choose which ‘preferred pronoun’ badge to wear or is there a “don’t care” option … I honestly don’t know.

Yes she does; Julie prefers to be addressed, and treated, in the same way as a real woman.

Andrew

[MikeK]

On MikeK Said:

…  Nobody alive today is or was a slave, or had a parent that was a slave.  …

With respect Mike, that’s an error of fact, making your conclusions wrong, at least as you’ve justified them so far!

Whilst it would be a much better world if the injustices that drive movements like woke were historic, this stuff is ongoing.  Evil is abroad   today and failing to deal with it because one believes in duff information is a shame.

In the UK Slavery has never been allowed because our legal system does not recognise people as property.   Brits cannot own another person.    Despite this working well enough for several centuries, it became apparent in this millennium that people in the UK were slaves.   Thus it became necessary to introduce the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

So far the anti-woke team haven’t covered themselves in glory.  Too much jumping to conclusions based on bad information.  I do my best to avoid causing unnecessary offence by being sensitive to language.    Doesn’t stop me from being direct when necessary : the anti-woke brigade need not fear me pulling any punches!

Dave

 

[Andrew Johnston]

On Andrew Johnston Said:

On Michael Gilligan Said:

Does Julie get to choose which ‘preferred pronoun’ badge to wear or is there a “don’t care” option … I honestly don’t know.

Yes she does; Julie prefers to be addressed, and treated, in the same way as a real woman.

Andrew

Thanks for that clear response, Andrew

MichaelG.

[SillyOldDuffer]

On SillyOldDuffer Said:

On MikeK Said:

…  Nobody alive today is or was a slave, or had a parent that was a slave.  …

With respect Mike, that’s an error of fact, making your conclusions wrong, at least as you’ve justified them so far!

Whilst it would be a much better world if the injustices that drive movements like woke were historic, this stuff is ongoing.  Evil is abroad   today and failing to deal with it because one believes in duff information is a shame.

In the UK Slavery has never been allowed because our legal system does not recognise people as property.   Brits cannot own another person.    Despite this working well enough for several centuries, it became apparent in this millennium that people in the UK were slaves.   Thus it became necessary to introduce the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

So far the anti-woke team haven’t covered themselves in glory.  Too much jumping to conclusions based on bad information.  I do my best to avoid causing unnecessary offence by being sensitive to language.    Doesn’t stop me from being direct when necessary : the anti-woke brigade need not fear me pulling any punches!

Dave

 

Yes, I should have added “in the 1st world”.  My intent was that people who bring up slavery, who use it as a crutch, are doing so where it doesn’t exist.  I’m in the US…Lots of black people bring up slavery, but they are very far removed from it.

Mike

 

[NealebParticipant @nealeb]

To come back to the original question – should we not ask notionally male and female threads to self-identify?

[Nealeb]

On Nealeb Said:

To come back to the original question – should we not ask notionally male and female threads to self-identify?

I’m pretty sure the original question was serious and not a mocking joke.

Mike

 

[Kiwi Bloke]

On Kiwi Bloke Said:

Recently, I have been communicating, by email, with a Frenchman. I’ve forgotten much of the French I learned >50 years ago, but Google Translate helps. I’m once again amazed by the strangeness of French inanimate objects having a gender (if I may use that word). Is that woke-friendly?

Confusingly, in French, screw is feminine, “la vis”, and a nut is masculine, “un écrou” .

Russell

[MikeK]

On MikeK Said:

On SillyOldDuffer Said:

On MikeK Said:

…  Nobody alive today is or was a slave, or had a parent that was a slave.  …

With respect Mike, that’s an error of fact, making your conclusions wrong, at least as you’ve justified them so far!

Whilst it would be a much better world if the injustices that drive movements like woke were historic, this stuff is ongoing.  Evil is abroad   today and failing to deal with it because one believes in duff information is a shame.

In the UK Slavery has never been allowed because our legal system does not recognise people as property.   Brits cannot own another person.    Despite this working well enough for several centuries, it became apparent in this millennium that people in the UK were slaves.   Thus it became necessary to introduce the Modern Slavery Act 2015.

So far the anti-woke team haven’t covered themselves in glory.  Too much jumping to conclusions based on bad information.  I do my best to avoid causing unnecessary offence by being sensitive to language.    Doesn’t stop me from being direct when necessary : the anti-woke brigade need not fear me pulling any punches!

Dave

 

Yes, I should have added “in the 1st world”.  My intent was that people who bring up slavery, who use it as a crutch, are doing so where it doesn’t exist.  I’m in the US…Lots of black people bring up slavery, but they are very far removed from it.

Mike

 

No they are not. They still have the same colored skin they had in 1865, which brands them for “special” treatment to this day. Well within living memory they were subjected to institutionalized-by-law prejudice and discrimination, segregated schools, Jim Crow laws and the like. And it still continues today but unofficially albeit quite pervasively in some places.

Imagine growing up knowing that your parents and grandparents had been forbidden by law to walk the streets of their hometown after sunset, live in the suburb of their choice, or attend the school or university of their choice. Or that their peers had been lynched for allegedly looking sideways at a white girl. You think that fallout from slavery would not influence your life? Let alone the present day prejudice faced from some police, employers and many others who still subscribe to outdated slave-era “master” attitudes.

[Andrew Johnston]

On Andrew Johnston Said:

Never mind male and female, hermaphroditic connectors are available; that is a connector that mates with itself.

Andrew

And there are hermaphrodite calipers, known politely in the US as Jenny leg calipers. Who Jenny was, I have no idea.

With similar politeness, in line with calling a toilet a bathroom, the Americans also refer to grease nipples as “zerks”.

And what about “mating” parts, as in carriage and bed ways on a lathe as mentioned in another thread?

[MikeK]

On MikeK Said:

On Nealeb Said:

To come back to the original question – should we not ask notionally male and female threads to self-identify?

I’m pretty sure the original question was serious and not a mocking joke.

Mike

 

My original question was maybe more in the league of idle musing, but whatever. I did not expect to open such a can of worms, but in retrospect probably should have!

[duncan webster 1Participant @duncanwebster1]

As we have strayed into the area of Spitfires and negative g, can someone explain why negative g caused by flying upside down is not a problem, but negative g caused by a sudden dive is? ‘m sure there is a rational explanation, but it does not spring immediately to mind

[JAParticipant @ja]

Duncan

A carburettor works upside down by, in effect, having a second float chamber for inverted flight. A problem occures when you change from one to the other. The carburettor can either gets too fuel or not enough. In general, a small hick-up from the engine as one changes from +ve to -ve g, and visa-versa, is not a problem but such events will always catch one out at the worst possible moment.

Before one asks, the engine on the ME109 had fuel injection so no float chamber. We started to look at fuel injection during the war but the replacement for the big aero piston engine was arriving. Beatrice Shilling went on to work on gas turbine combustion and ramjets. Before retiring she led the investigation into taking off from wet and slush covered runways following the Munich Air Disaster. After the war she raced, with her husband, a much modified pre-war Lagonda. The Norton she bought secondhand and did all the tuning work herself.

JA

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Is flying upside down actually negative G. If you took your seatbelt off you would drop out of the plane so positive G is active.

[Hopper]

On Hopper Said:

On Andrew Johnston Said:

…

…

With similar politeness, in line with calling a toilet a bathroom…

What we call the place we go excrete is almost always a euphemism.   Toilet was originally the act of dressing and grooming, with no bladders, bowels or menses involved.   Then the Victorians invented a porcelain apparatus and needed a name – now we call this object a toilet, often located in the room devoted to washing and grooming.

When being ‘taken short’ in someone else’s house makes it urgent to ask where to go for relief, good manners (a close relative of woke and political correctness), has required a euphemism for millennia in all cultures. Loo, Ladies and Gents, Powder Room, Rest Room, Little Boys Room, lavatory, WC, Throne, Bathroom, Cloakroom, Convenience etc.  We also have options to suit less formal occasions, when ‘out with the lads’:  bog, crapper, head.   Plus many phrases that describe the act, more or less directly: going to ‘see a man about a dog’,  ‘turn my bike round’, or ‘point Percy at the porcelain.’

Why bother with manners and tact?  Respecting the concerns and interests of others is a good way of avoiding conflict, because it proves one understands the rules, and wasn’t badly brought up or poorly educated.  People who understand are more likely to be in control of their emotions.   In a pub, who should we most wary of?  The polite well-dressed man sipping a liqueur in the corner, or the yahoo aggressively gobbing off ignorant opinions in yer face?   Though the liqueur drinker might be a serial killer, odds on it’s the yahoo who will kick-off.

Lest anyone think my defence of woke is uncritical, certainly not.   Woke is as flawed as any other human endeavour, a mix of good and bad.  It isn’t particularly organised, so anyone can suggest new ideas, not all good!   Context matters too: quite a lot of woke makes more sense in the USA due to their very different history.  I support woke’s desire to address injustice, but not the conclusions of the wilder element.

Though woke might challenge a few of our assumptions, Engineering has nothing to fear from it.

Dave

 

[Andrew Johnston]

On Andrew Johnston Said:

Never mind male and female, hermaphroditic connectors are available; that is a connector that mates with itself.

Andrew

My pet hate!

Having wired up many hermaphrodite connectors over years I still find them confusing, for example an extension lead with identical connectors on each end needs its wires ‘crossed over’ (pin number wise). Not too bad with 2 pole conns but not fun when there are 28 pins and 28 sockets in teh same shell.

As it happens, the connectors would not mate (or should that be engage?) with themselves as they were chassis and cable mount plugs and sockets so different mechanically.

Ian P

[JasonB]

On JasonB Said:

Is flying upside down actually negative G. If you took your seatbelt off you would drop out of the plane so positive G is active.

I would say that flying upside down is negative ‘g’, at least from the viewpoint of the pilot. If I am flying the normal way up and undo the harness nothing happens; I stay in the seat. If I push forward positive ‘g’ reduces and if the ‘g’ reaches zero and then goes negative I will rise off the seat, restrained only by the harness. Similarly if I am flying upside down (-1g) I am lifted off the seat and am only restrained by the harness.

Andrew

[Ian P]

On Ian P Said:

…Not too bad with 2 pole conns but not fun when there are 28 pins and 28 sockets in teh same shell.

The MIL-DTL-38999 connectors are a nightmare as the pin layouts for socket and plug are reversed, but they are not true hermaphrodite connectors. A true hermaphroditic connector is a single connector that mates with itself:

https://www.te.com/en/products/connectors/lighting-connectors/intersection/hermaphroditic-connectors.html?tab=pgp-story

Andrew

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

What is the point of a connector that mates to itself, or does it actually join to another identical connector?

[Author]

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