My brothers in law are engineers. They are good ones; one mechanical one composites. One does worldwide roll outs of cars and vans, the other aero and space.
Now they can turn their hands to almost anything.
Build a wood panelled bathroom from scratch? Not a problem.
Create millimetre perfect covering for a front room sofa having never sewn or used a sewing machine before? Not a problem.
Run the IT systems for a design centre of excellence? Not a problem.
Design manufacture and work out how to deploy a science instrument to Mars? No worries.
They basically look at something says things like “Yup I can do that” and do it or “Yup I could do that, but I don’t have the time” and get someone in, and very rarely “No, don’t want to even try” and pick up the phone to a specialist.
They know how things work, or should work, or can work, and what they need to make them work, and the properties of the stuff in the thing that they want to work etc.
So I reckon that someone with Engineering-4 would cover lots of other things like Mechanical, Electrical, Gravatics, Carpentry etc. but would also know where they would need to say “No, don’t want to even try”.
Best regards,
Ewan
From: xxxxxx@simplelists.com <xxxxxx@simplelists.com>
Sent: 15 October 2020 09:33
To: xxxxxx@simplelists.com
Subject: Re: [TML] Query: Do Traveller Power Plant or Jump Drives Use Gravity Control Internally?
That was Andy Slack - I actually remember reading those columns of his when they were first published! ;^D
Personally, I wouldn't cascade it like that, just say that, depending on circumstance, the Engineer-4 might well be able to handle a task without suffering for being unskilled. I actually disagreed, then and now with the premise as expressed, since Engineer in CT to me doesn't cover the basic infrastructure of a ship, that's more Mechanic or Electronic. Engineer covers the big-ticket items. The guy with Engineer-4 is a specialist who probably doesn't spend much time outside his engine room...
That's CT of course, other flavours of Traveller draw the lines differently.
Cheers,
Jim
On 15/10/2020 07:21, xxxxxx@gmail.com wrote: