{"author":"Henry Petroski","author_id":"Henry+Petroski","total_quotes":26,"quotes":[{"text":"Successful design is not the achievement of perfection but the minimization and accommodation of imperfection.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["achievement","perfection "],"id":22066,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"I emphasize that virtually every engineering calculation is ultimately a failure calculation, because without a failure criterion against which to measure the calculated result, it is a meaningless number.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["engineering","measure","number "],"id":23577,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"Design is nothing if not decision making.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["decision","nothing "],"id":43054,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"Science is about knowing engineering is about doing. ","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["engineering","doing","knowing "],"id":46227,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"We call the fates of the Titanic and the Concordia - as well as those of the space shuttles Challenger and Columbia - 'accidents.' Foreseeing such undesirable events is what engineers are expected to do. However, design trade-offs leave technological systems open to failings once predicted, but later forgotten.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["space","technological "],"id":49176,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"The paradox is that when we model future designs on past successes, we are inviting failure down the line; when we take into account past failures and anticipate potential new ways in which failure can occur, we are more likely to produce successful designs.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["future","past","successful "],"id":90022,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"All conventional wisdom has an element of truth to it, but good design requires more than an element of truth - it requires an ensemble of correct assumptions and valid calculations.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["wisdom","good","truth "],"id":99508,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"Because they are so humbled by their creations, engineers are naturally conservative in their expectations of technology. They know that the perfect system is the stuff of science fiction, not of engineering fact, and so everything must be treated with respect.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["technology","science "],"id":130058,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"I was always told that I was good in mathematics, and I guess my grades and standardized test scores supported that. My worst subjects were those that generally involved a lot of reading - English and history. So, having good test scores in math and mediocre ones in reading, I was naturally advised to major in engineering in college.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["good","mathematics","college "],"id":135467,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"},{"text":"I have always been fascinated by the way things work and how they came to take the form that they did. Writing about these things satisfies my curiosity about the made world while at the same time giving me an opportunity to design a new explanation for the processes that shape it.","author":"Henry Petroski","tags":["work","time","opportunity "],"id":140907,"author_id":"Henry+Petroski"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":26,"pages":3,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}