150's and 172's about the only planes flying!!

Margy Natalie writes:

Damned but I hate to agree. Athough I think much of the computer craze
is now a cause. They are very attractive and everyone has one and they
are right there.

I'm sure people said the same thing about telephones and electricity in their
early days.

It should also be kept in mind that, like telephones and electricity,
computers are a means to an end, not an end in themselves. Working on a
computer could mean just about anything, since anything that involves
information can be put on a computer. So a kid could be looking for porn, or
doing research for school, or reading about sports, or learning calculus.
Just because he does it with a computer doesn't make it good or bad, any more
than having electricity in the house is good or bad.

Couple that with "don't go out until I get home from
work", "No friends over until I get home from work", etc. and you have
the perfect set up for computer kids.

True.

A friend who is a professor of
mechanical engineering summed it up quite well, she said, "computers
have been a leveler, it used to be girls couldn't DO anything, now no
one can DO anything". Refering of course to those basic skills our kids
no longer have (cutting, sawing, soldering, attaching, etc.).

There is less and less need for those skills, since most items today are
manufactured by semi-automated production lines. The average person will
never need to saw or solder anything, so the skill is not useful, and he won't
miss it if he doesn't have it.

I always had a model club at school and lots of people thought I was
nuts letting kids (7th and 8th graders) near exacto knives, etc. I
didn't have on injury (but I did lay the law down pretty thick).

If there had been an injury you would have been bankrupted by a lawsuit. You
were very brave.

--
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Mxsmanic wrote in
:

Jay Honeck writes:

But you're right about computers. They have sapped the life out of
our kids, by allowing them to experience the world without ever
leaving their chairs. I suppose you might look at this as a good
thing, from an evolutionary standpoint, but I find it terribly sad.

Computers are the effect, not the cause. Kids resort to computers
because just about anything with the slightest element of risk is now
forbidden to them.

You're an idiot.

Bertie

"Mxsmanic" wrote in message
...

Computers are the effect, not the cause. Kids resort to computers because
just about anything with the slightest element of risk is now forbidden to
them. Everything that requires movement or strenuous exercise or being
away
from constant supervision for more than a few minutes or involves any type
of
insurance or liability (which covers practically everything) is no longer
an
option. They live with their parents in a state of fear of everything,
and
about the only thing that carries very little risk is playing with a
computer.



Oh yeah, roller skates, bicycles, pogo sticks, 4 wheelers, skate boards, BB
guns, fireworks, baseball, football, RC airplanes, swimming pools, lawn
mowers, sling shots, go-carts, coaster cars, mini bikes, unicycles, play
grounds, tree swings, pocket knives, pet rodents, water skiing, horse back
riding, calf roping, and many others - have been outlawed for participants
less than 21 years old in the United States now for gosh, how many years MX,
I don't even recall.

Actually children that lock themselves in a room with a computer, and use it
for nothing more constructive than running flight simulator, and pretending
to be something their not on the Usenet, are actually few and far between.

Maxwell writes:

Oh yeah, roller skates, bicycles, pogo sticks, 4 wheelers, skate boards, BB
guns, fireworks, baseball, football, RC airplanes, swimming pools, lawn
mowers, sling shots, go-carts, coaster cars, mini bikes, unicycles, play
grounds, tree swings, pocket knives, pet rodents, water skiing, horse back
riding, calf roping, and many others - have been outlawed for participants
less than 21 years old in the United States now for gosh, how many years MX,
I don't even recall.

They don't have to be outlawed to be forbidden.

--
Transpose mxsmanic and gmail to reach me by e-mail.

On 2007-05-03, Jay Honeck wrote:
But you're right about computers. They have sapped the life out of
our kids, by allowing them to experience the world without ever
leaving their chairs.

You can always say $NEWTHING has sapped the life out of/displaced
$OLDTHING from our kids lives. Same thing was said about TV. Same thing
was said about books.

Computers greatly enhanced my life, not sapped it. I wrote my first
computer program age 8, on a Sinclair ZX-81. Computers allowed me to not
experience the world, but make new worlds (albeit very simple ones). It
opened a huge world of creative opportunity for me that otherwise
wouldn't have existed - since when writing a program, all you need is
time (and kids have a lot of it) and not money (which kids don't have).

There's nothing as much fun as seeing your friends play in a virtual
world _you_ invented.

I think it's pretty curmudgeonly to say computers "sap the lives from
our kids", they do nothing of the sort - in many cases, they greatly
enhance the learning and knowledge of our children. Few things stick
better than self-directed learning. There may be lots of hanging out in
IRC and on IM or playing games, but I see children of my friends
learning in ways that prior generations simply couldn't, and by and
large they are smarter for it.

Back to aviation - aviation is never going to be something with mass
appeal: it's a very unnatural thing for ground dwelling beings to do,
and most people find that flying as an experience spans from something
mildly uncomfortable to terrifying. Few people actually enjoy being in
the air. Face it: those of us who do are somewhat weird (in the nicest
possible way). Especially when you consider what we are prepared to
spend on ancient aircraft, costing three times as much as a Mercedes
Benz and not even having AC, let alone being quiet enough inside to
conduct a conversation without a pair of David Clamps. The economics
works against us: those of us free enough (i.e. young and not married)
typically can't afford it, those who are earning enough either have
kids, an unsupportive (of flying) spouse, or more frequently both, and
the older people who's children have left still have the unsupportive
spouse who wants to spend the money on the house, not a plane.

So you have to hook them young, before they get a spouse, so hopefully
one of their spousal qualifiers is "must be supportive of flying". Then
the rugged individualism of the pilot personality works against us: set
up a scholarship so that young people can learn to fly? No! Never! That
includes the dirty word "subsidy!"

The latter, however, is just what we may need. Our tiny glider club
(with only about a dozen regular members) has taught several teenagers
to fly who otherwise would never have been able to afford it thanks to a
scholarship fund run by the BGA. Perhaps there's therefore some hope
that soaring at least can keep interest in general aviation going
because it can hook interested people young. It's not enough to give
kids a flight in a Young Eagles type thing. While this is good, if we
want to keep a supply of new, young pilots - you have to give them a
reason to keep coming back to the airport.

Hopefully the Sport Pilot thing in the US may help, too, in making a
supply of somewhat affordable aircraft (even if the new sport aircraft
now won't be affordable until they are 20 years old). My own aircraft
turns 62 years old this November, the aircraft that I used to own turns
61 years old this year too. To many people in normal jobs who are less
than 35 years old, ancient aircraft are the only affordable ones -
this is not sustainable. We also need a supply of newer affordable
aircraft, and by affordable I mean must not cost significantly more
to buy than a midsized car. We need something new (or at least new-ish)
which is as much fun to fly as my elderly Auster, but without costing
more than a high end Mercedes Benz. While there's nothing wrong with our
old plane, the truth is the number of aircraft whose purchase price is
in that price bracket is falling all the time.

--
Yes, the Reply-To email address is valid.
Oolite-Linux: an Elite tribute: http://oolite-linux.berlios.de

On 5/3/2007 10:03:56 AM, Margy Natalie wrote:

Before you ask, all the fly-in spots have been filled for this event and
there is already a waiting list.

Margy, I am certainly do not mean to attack the messenger here, but does
anyone besides me find this ironic?


--
Peter

Peter R. wrote:
On 5/3/2007 10:03:56 AM, Margy Natalie wrote:


Before you ask, all the fly-in spots have been filled for this event and
there is already a waiting list.


Margy, I am certainly do not mean to attack the messenger here, but does
anyone besides me find this ironic?


Why ironic? We can only bring in 50 airplanes and our communications
guy put a sign up sheet at OSH last year. I can tell you the average
age of the pilots is NOT 25. Anyone within fair striking distance
should tell their friends and neighbors! Of course friends and
neighbors of pilots get to do things like sit in airplanes, but I can
tell you there are LOTS of people who have NEVER had the opportunity to
get anywhere near anything other than an airliner. If each one of us
(Pilots) inspired one kid a year for the next 10 years to go out when he
or she was 25 and get a ticket, we would have done really well. And if
we each got 2 kids, imagine, 2 kids a year, well we might have a movement...

Margy

On 5/3/2007 11:28:36 AM, Margy Natalie wrote:

Why ironic? We can only bring in 50 airplanes and our communications
guy put a sign up sheet at OSH last year.

Hmm, upon rereading maybe I don't understand the definition of "fly-in
spots." Does this mean that if I wanted to fly to the event that I could not
do so or does this mean something else?

I had interpreted "fly-in spots" to mean number of airplanes allowed to fly
to the airport for the event and if so, it seemed unfortunate that such a
wonderful event would be limited by that. Driving to the event would be out
of the question for me.

--
Peter

Peter R. wrote:
On 5/3/2007 11:28:36 AM, Margy Natalie wrote:


Why ironic? We can only bring in 50 airplanes and our communications
guy put a sign up sheet at OSH last year.


Hmm, upon rereading maybe I don't understand the definition of "fly-in
spots." Does this mean that if I wanted to fly to the event that I could not
do so or does this mean something else?

I had interpreted "fly-in spots" to mean number of airplanes allowed to fly
to the airport for the event and if so, it seemed unfortunate that such a
wonderful event would be limited by that. Driving to the event would be out
of the question for me.

Yeah, it's a "by invitation" fly-in as we can't handle too many
aircraft. Jay Honeck flew in the year before last. There's always next
year to fly in. I know some aircraft are parking at the FBO and then
getting ground transport down.

Margy

On Thu, 03 May 2007 10:03:58 -0400, Margy Natalie
wrote:

Another BIG problem with GA is we aren't getting enough kids involved.
The Young Eagles program is great, but it's not enough. Kids can't hang
over the airport fence anymore, model airplanes have just about died, RC


They do here and we even are installing a picnic area where the public
an sit and watch. I've taken a good many "fence hangers" for rides.

is expensive for a 12 year old. It used to be kids wanted to grow up
and learn how to fly and airplane, now they want to grow up to be a game
programmer. That's a problem! If you look at the kid's birthday party
supply places there are NO airplane things, and you can't buy an
airplane shaped balloon. That says a lot.

WARNING SHAMELESS PLUG FOLLOWS

So if you want to bring the kids out go to

http://www.nasm.si.edu/events/eventD...fm?eventID=602

It will be a great day for the kids! Kids = ages 1-101

Before you ask, all the fly-in spots have been filled for this event and
there is already a waiting list.

Margy