[Have Ruck - Will Travel]

You'd be surprised how a genius' brain locks up when asked how his new thing will make money.

That is why we have (insert fanfare here) ENGINEERS!

If you have a widget you don't know what to do with, make sure that you show it to as many engineers as you can (and engineers from as many different fields as you can). Even a description is good, but a finished working widget that they can touch and feel is the best. Chances are one of them will know a killer application for it. If not, it will stay rolling around in his mind until he FINDS an application for it.

[E Rocc]

You'd be surprised how a genius' brain locks up when asked how his new thing will make money.

That is why we have (insert fanfare here) ENGINEERS!

If you have a widget you don't know what to do with, make sure that you show it to as many engineers as you can (and engineers from as many different fields as you can). Even a description is good, but a finished working widget that they can touch and feel is the best. Chances are one of them will know a killer application for it. If not, it will stay rolling around in his mind until he FINDS an application for it.

People often don't realize there's fundamental differences between scientists and engineers. Scientist play around with the possible, and sometimes don't even seem to recognize the concept of probability. Engineers are all about probabilities: minimizing the chances of undesirable possibilities while maximizing the chances of desirable ones.

Scientists often seem to live in ivory towers as a result. In college, a couple of my science professors were against nuclear power because of what could happen. Not a single one of my engineering professors opposed it, because they knew the probabilities of anything happening when proper safety methods were in place were infinitesimal.

These days we see the same thing with global warming/ozone holes. Scientists are more likely to believe in them than engineers.

-Eric