On the (Virtual) Titanic 2
Ladies and Gentleman: I am writing this post from the top deck of the HMS Titanic 2. This is the most powerful ship (of state) in the world. Unsinkable. Nothing can stop us. Get out of our way! Well, it is true we burn a lot of fuel on the Titanic and leave astern a big swath of liquid, solid and air waste, but that is what you do when you are so big and famous. Nothing can match us in size, power or speed.
The fuel use does concern me. This ship of ours was designed in a bygone era, when fuel was cheap, domestic and available. If we had to restrict our fuel use, all the famous Titanic features could be at risk. Our ship would go slower, our food not so fully cooked, our interior spaces not so comfortable. And there are no refueling ports in the mid-Atlantic.
Our prior captains have been saying that we cannot or need not change. Now a captain says we need to change but not very much. One executive officer, an Officer Gore, thought differently, but we did not want to change and he did not ever get promoted to captain. A Captain Bush is in command now while our crew makes some stops in some very strange places in order to show the locals how to live like us. That has not been so successful. Our crew members have been gone for quite a while. I hope they get back soon.
The more I think about it, the Titanic 2, the way it is, is not the ship I want to be on. I don't really need to go that fast, or leave so much trash in our wake. I don't like worrying where we will get our fuel all the time. Perhaps the Titanic 2 can be refitted, made more efficient and cleaner.
What's that? The captain says there are icebergs ahead. He says we are so fast and powerful he wants to rush by a few just to demonstrate our power. I certainly hope he knows what he is doing. I wouldn't want to do any irreparable damage done to this ship. There is no other ship quite like her in the world. I hope we can keep sailing on an improved Titanic 2 for a long, long time.
Best regards
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Harvest 1:19PM (11/16/2007)
ech... I like green autos because the make economic sense. They're good for business, in other words, they're a product fulfilling a need.
Please quit forcing me to read articles that have nothing remotely to do with cars and are instead biased liberal prospectives about American foreign and domestic policy.
I would like America to be more green as well. That's why I chose an engineering career focusing on those efforts. It's the engineers, scientists, researchers, designers, architects, builders, and workers that will make a brighter tomorrow happen. Not journalists and metaphors, sorry.
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Joe 12:05PM (11/16/2007)
The useless articles that get posted on ABG never cease to amaze me. Be they completely misinformed, reporting on something old, or just a political rant hiding behind an allegory.
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Mik_Cal 4:01PM (11/16/2007)
Um, actually, the demand for those engineer's services will be IN PART spurred by things like metaphors and allegories. Engineers are usually lousy salespeople for their own efforts. Non-engineers and some engineers can "GET" things in a deeper way when it is expressed in a metaphor than when it is stated in neutral scientific language. If you want to understand how language is built on metaphor read "Metaphors We Live By" by George Lakoff.
Engineers were happy to build devices powered by unsustainable fuels until the market started to tell them that was not the way to go. There are countless examples in the history of technology were a superior technology was defeated through poor marketing and use of things like metaphor and "story".
The Titanic allegory is actually a good one.
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Joe 2:13AM (11/17/2007)
The titanic allegory is hackneyed and has no relevance to green automobiles, giving it no place on this site.
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Chris 9:48AM (11/17/2007)
Actually, the great ship was not "HMS Titanic", as that would indicate that she was part of the Royal Navy (and not the privately held White Star Line). Instead, her prefix was RMS, which stood for "Royal Mail Ship", as the Titanic was under contract to deliver mail across the Atlantic.
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Arnie 11:40AM (11/17/2007)
Damn it must be tempting for a bunch of naive liberals who have got themselves a popular blog to abuse it. Why would bullsh*t irrelevant drivel like this be posted here otherwise? I thought this site was about cars, not hi-school grade liberal essays.
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