A Lesson In Thinking It Through

[Steve R.]

Amazon Prime had a very interesting documentary on the development of British radar in preparing for WWII. It did not delve into discussing US or German radar development. The kicker, in this documentary, is that the Germans had a hazy perception that the British possessed radar but they were unable to confirm that. Consequently, when war did break-out the Germans unable to take British radar into account.

It turns out that the British established their radar system based on existing technologies and available equipment. For the sake of simplicity, I will simply label that as a "primitive" system. The Germans on the other hand were developing an (advanced) pulsed based radar system, that can simply be labelled as "advanced" for purposes on contrast. Again, the documentary did not get into the technical details of the German radar systems.

The take-away from this documentary is that the Germans were unable to perceive of British radar as existing was because it was based on a different technology. The Germans were able to detect the electromagnetic radiation being emitted from the British radars, but they never thought it through.

PS: This reminds me of a gotcha math question from my school days. The math problem as proposed, is that you have a boat with "X" feet of free-board. You add "Z" pounds of weight to the boat. How far will the boat sink into the water? If you simply applied the appropriate equation, the boat would sink "X" + "Y" feet into the water. The correct answer, however, was that the boat would sink all the way to the bottom. All those who responded with the computed answer of "X" + "Y" feet got that question marked as wrong. (I do not recall if that question was ever in one of my tests or if it was the instructor rambling on about the need to think about your answers.)

 

[MarkK]

The take-away from this documentary is that the Germans were unable to perceive of British radar as existing was because it was based on a different technology. The Germans were able to detect the electromagnetic radiation being emitted from the British radars, but they never thought it through.

• This is why we must always cultivate in ourselves humility and respect for those with whom we disagree. It is always possible that in our own views we are the Germans, blind to countervailing evidence by the obvious--to us--superiority of our own understandings.
• The Germans' fundamental error was being completely convinced they were superior. This view both entitled them to domination, and prevented them from achieving it, all at tremendous cost.

 

[NauticalGent]

• This is why we must always cultivate in ourselves humility and respect for those with whom we disagree. It is always possible that in our own views we are the Germans, blind to countervailing evidence by the obvious--to us--superiority of our own understandings.
• The Germans' fundamental error was being completely convinced they were superior. This view both entitled them to domination, and prevented them from achieving it, all at tremendous cost.

I suspect you and I usually fall on different sides when it comes to how we "think" things should be, but what you said is spot-on.