“mandelbrot changed the way ibm's engineers thought about the cause of noise. bursts of errors had always sent the engineers looking for a man sticking a screwdriver somewhere.”

“I was an engineer with Fairbanks Morse, Mr. President. I helped design some of the engines in their locomotives before the war, but then transferred my knowledge to the engines used in the Grant and Lee tanks, many of which were sent to the British.” FDR was once again intrigued by what he heard. “The engine that pulls my train is a Fairbanks Morse locomotive.”Brock beamed. “Yes it is, sir. Engine 978.”

“Technology frightens me to death. It's designed by engineers to impress other engineers. And they always come with instruction booklets that are written by engineers for other engineers — which is why almost no technology ever works.”

“The ancient Romans had a tradition: whenever one of their engineers constructed an arch, as the capstone was hoisted into place, the engineer assumed accountability for his work in the most profound way possible: he stood under the arch.”

“Apple Computers is a famous example: it was founded by (mostly Republi­can) computer engineers who broke from IBM in Silicon Valley in the 198os, forming little democratic circles of twenty to forty people with their laptops in each other's garages.”

“Copying is about reverse-engineering.”