The origin of the economic growth

A few days ago I was in a building tools store where I was seeking a set of wrenches to buy. When I found it, I happened to notice a caption on a package -- "Made in Great Britain". "That's what we've come down to", -- I thought joylessly, continuing to seek a spirit level that I needed. "Where is it made?", -- I wondered when I located it at a store. "Ontario, Canada??! Is it really that in the biggest country in the whole world -- the country where the first satellite was ever launched -- there isn't any enterprise able to make such a simple tool as a spirit level? Is it really need to carry it across the Atlantic?" When I get out of a shop it happened to me to thought about the origin of the economic growth.

I'm not pretend to write an economic inquiry that fits rigorous requirements of a scientific paper. Essentially, the idea I've come to is very simple. In fact, the origin of the economic growth of any country, any nation in any age lays is ability to make good things. Period. Now let's consider that simple fact in more detail.

If you think of the history of human kind you'll notice that the history of our development is the history of appearance of new things. It doesn't matter how complex they were -- so complex as a first steam engine, an airplane, a car, a NASA space shuttle, a first nuclear power station, a telegraph, a computer, a first fiber-optic cable ans so on -- or so simple as a ball-point pen, a wheel or a sail. To make creating of new things possible there are must be suitable system of education, work ethics, and, in the higher stages of social development -- science, technologies and industrial culture. All of these conditions are not valuable for themselves -- they're valuable as the necessary conditions to invent and produce new good things. And those new things are intended to serve people! New things make life more comfortable, increase work efficiency and as a result free time for leisure, education, culture, religion and, finally, for more rich spiritual life.

The more different and good things are -- the more national welfare is. And, on the contrary, the less different and good things are -- the less national welfare is. If there is no many good things that are being constantly created there is no education, no culture, no science. And, in this case, such unlucky nation is going to be a banana republic. At this point let me remind you a set of wrenches made in the UK. So, does it mean we aren't able to make such a simple tool? Yes, it does unfortunately. And does it mean we're losing our industrial culture, work ethics and science? Yes, it does again. So why and when did it happen?

New things are being invented by engineers and created by workers in enterprises. To produce them the society must have an appropriate educational system and culture, encouraging young men to be ones. There must be a conventional system of views saying that to be and engineer and worker is good. Lawyers aren't able to make new things; and managers... and shop assistants... and bank clerks... but our education system produces them a lot, and our ethics encourages young men to be managers, bank clerks, lawyers and so on. Because in Russia to be an engineer is to work hard and to earn little money but to be a lawyer is to work far less and to earn a lot of money. But, let me say you, that a lawyers and managers will never create national welfare. Never. They're only able to consume things, not to produce. To consume things that are made in the United States, for instance. By the way, how about the USA? In fact, they are able to produce almost everything needed to modern society. Even if their enterprises are located in China they are American indeed because they use an American equipment and American technologies. But we, Russian people, at the same time aren't able to make just a wrench. Are you still despise the US? Excuse me, what did you say? You have the fridge that is made in Russia? It is "Indesit"? Oh, come on.... Just answer who built the enterprise where you fridge was made. Italians, Germans -- actually it doesn't matter because they definitely aren't Russians.

The ability to produce good things is the measure of national welfare and self-sufficiency of nation. Finally it leads to reach, well-educated society where poverty is rarity and people enjoy life. There is no need to fight with poverty but there is need to learn how to produce good quality things. And this ability leads to the economic growth. Mining and oil extraction doesn't lead to it -- despite the money they can bring. Even if our gross national product, the GNP is increasing inflated by oil incomes it doesn't actually mean that we have the economic growth. As for me, the economic growth will begin when I'll find just a good wrench in a building tools store with a caption "Made in Russia".

On privacy

Let’s talk about privacy briefly. Privacy -- is not just a word. There are a whole complex of conventional views on human life and acceptable norms of behaviour behind it. These views and norms define how we can act and speak and how we can’t, what is good and what is bad. In the legal meaning privacy -- is a set of laws regulating relations between citizens and a state. The legal basis of privacy defines your rights and what can be taken away from you and what can’t be. Generally speaking, the conception of privacy has psychological, social and legal aspects. Further I will touch only psychological and social aspects of privacy and omit discussing legal aspects of it. I will rest upon exclusively my individual opinions, individual experience and talk solely with regard to situation in Russian society.

What does lie behind privacy? Speaking in one sentence, the right to be left alone is privacy. It is the right to be staying alone, the right to personal secrets, the right to live your own life. The principles of privacy involve that your private life is respected, that everybody keeps your nose out of it, that nobody discusses your relations with opposite gender and your sexual orientation, that your way of choosing clothes, your opinions, your political convictions don’t cause heated discussion, at least in your presence. From accept of privacy is followed that nobody imposes on you, that your personal space and personal dwelling is respected, that value of your time is unquestionable for people around you and nobody fills it with all sort of trifles. Finally, privacy -- is the right to be one’s own and entirely exercise it.

The term “privacy” doesn't have the adequate translation into Russian that would reflect the deep and versatility of that word. It is simply the effect of the fact that the recognition of the importance of privacy, recognition of the necessity that views lying behind privacy must act a role in human life is absence in Russian society. Why it takes place -- is the separate and complex question. However, it must be realised, that the conception of privacy is specific for the West with its highly developed traditions of individualism and individualistic philosophy. In Russia with our communal mentality, aggravated in the last century by soviet experience, numerous national tragedies and shocks, notorious communal apartments for arising of the privacy conception just there wasn’t the ground. In our traditions deeply and firmly had been implanted the negative implication of the word “individualism” itself as involved egoism, ego-centrism, and heartlessness. But even the superficial acquaintance with the west individualism dispels that idea quickly. In Russia, the collocation “private life” has a sort of diffident shade of meaning and often used to hide behind it some actions not so good from perspective of social morality, though the such reputation absolutely undeserved. Meanwhile, individualism and privacy are inseparably linked with each other, and they can’t exist without each other. Individualism, private life and independence are essential components of privacy. If there isn't the accept of individualism there isn’t any trace of privacy.

Privacy begins from that moment when you begin respect your own right for private life, right to be left alone and right for personal secrets yourself. Didn’t you often meet people shamelessly telling about all their sham and true diseases, all gossips about their acquaintances and friends, all scandals occurred at work, about all quarrels with wife or girlfriend, unpaid penalties, leaked fridge, cat that was born, about that next door guy, the last letter from friend, pretended to be gay so that to appear glamour with imagined delights of imagined same-sex-love? Did you happen to hear that disgusting mix of half-lie and half-truth about oneself, fictions and gossips about others, peppered with own feeble-mind and greed for another's secrets -- only for not to seem dirty oneself on the background of other's dirties? It isn't possible to expect esteem for your own secrets from others if your aren't respect them by yourself. If you expose on global overview your dirty clothes though awkwardly covered by some kind of excuses, you can expect with confidence you will be dresses in those dirty clothes some day. The average man, your so called closest friend, will throw your excuses away and put those dirty clothes on you. And it isn't necessary to say after that he's a gossip. You handed him your own secrets yourself. You aren't better than he is. Don't want to wear dirty clothes? Don't show them to anyone.

The accept of own inalienable right for privacy provides you bullet-proof immunity in our nonsimple conditions of trampling it on almost every move. Do you want to know with what a girl I go out? Do you want to know why I visited a doctor? Or what the last letter from my mom was about? Why I'm laming in the one leg? Or why and when my flat was burnt? Or why my heart is heavy? Just leave me alone. It is no concern of you. It's my life -- not yours. This is my right for privacy.

Respect to own privacy and protection from invasion of other people results in respect to another's privacy. Another man has the same right to be left alone as well as you. Did you see someone you know at the romantic appointment with a beauty girl whereas he's married to another one? Do you suspect he is sick but conceals that? Don't discuss it with colleagues. Did you catch a glimpse of someone's letter? Don't report its contents to all friends by e-mail. Did you see risque photos of your friend in Internet? Don't send the link to them to all your acquaintances. Don't be a gossip so that not to be an object of a gossip. Respect to secrets of others is the back side of respect to secrets of your own.

The starting point of privacy is keeping self-respect. Just begin to respect and protect your own secrets -- all the other is follows from that.

Software engineers

Introduction

I’m a software engineer. I’m proud of my occupation and its influence on the modern dynamic world. An ordinary man of 21st century encounters with results of our work almost everywhere, even not realizing that. However, it’s surprising, that our occupation is surrounded with myths and wrong ideas as if we’re sorcerers. In this short essay I would like to break the myths and tell about the joys and sorrows of the job.

Who are we?

Software engineers as it follows from words construct and develop software or, more simply, programs. I haven’t used the term “write” deliberately, because it simplifies activity behind it. Software constructing is an engineering discipline which is like building houses, roads, bridges or cars. Although it has one essential difference – during constructing software we don’t deal with material objects. Engineering software, a developer operates absolute abstractions that he can juggle around as he wants. If a builder can’t overcome the law of universal gravitation even if he wants, a software engineer can create an environment inside a digital computer where it is possible. We will discuss it futher. Since digital computers have been mentioned, it is necessary to explain that nowadays the term “digital computer” can be applied to almost any electronic device that you use on a regular basis: a cell phone for talking to your friends; an electronic watch you wear on your hand; an iPod for listening music; a TV for watching news and movies; microwave for preparing delicious food; washing machine for looking neat -- anything that has a display and buttons can be called a digital computer. And, certainly, computers themselves -- from small palm-handled PCs to big workstations, servers and supercomputers. Why can we call all of those devices digital computers? Well, roughly speaking, because in all of them a central processor, performing logical functions, some kind of memory and a kind of input-output system can be found.

The matter is that in all of those devices that we call “hardware”, there must be a mechanism to control them. That is, when you turn a washing machine on, and command to soak the clothes, wash it under temperature of 60 deg. of C, wring it out, dry it out and finally get turned off – the machine must know what to do. Software is the mechanism. Software is simply a set of instructions invented by software engineers and stored inside a machine for different situations. Those instructions can be rather simple, as in case of a washing machine, or extremely complex as in cases of self-guidance systems of military rockets, plane autopilots or operating systems for personal computers like Microsoft Windows Vista – so complex that a single person isn't able to master them completely. Sure, all of that software is very different. Very small, working in a single type of devices, or very huge, performing general functions. The most significant common part of all types of software is that it is made by human beings or, to be more exactly, by software engineers -- by us.

Where are we made? :))

We are trained in different educational institutions. Training a software developer is a complex, serious and expensive business. A lot depends on the university as only university with a good technical and science base, and well-developed connections with the industry are able to produce skilled engineers. For sure, these universities may produce specialists unable to create something actually working, but getting education without a computer and awareness about modern industry needs -- is a hopeless affair. The leading universities in our specialty -- probably as well as in all other specialties -- are situated in the United States. California Institute of Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Stanford University (Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the inventers and founders of Google carried out scientific projects there, for instance) -- these are the universities from where were produced geniune diamonds, true modern gods of the industry.

“Why changing something you are always breaking something down?!” or joys and sorrows of the occupation

As I have mentioned above, I don’t like the term “writing programs”. Its origin might be concealed in those dark and wild times :)) when there were few computers, they were huge, there was little memory, computers cost a whole lot of money, machine time was very expensive and programs were rather small. Actually, making software is a successive, multistage process that strongly resembles construction of some kind of a device.

Usually we have a customer -- the one who directly or indirectly pays the money. In my case it might be a company owner, a chief executive office, a chief information officer and so on. The customer sets a task. Before we begin creating something there must be a task -- a problem that needs to be solve and there must be customer’s decision that for solving problem there must be software. At this stage it is necessary to define clear what the software must do -- and, not less necessary, -- where it will be work: in a specific model of a cell phone, in billions of personal computers around the world or in a single nuclear power station. Then we define technical requirements -- detailed and rigorous description of functions and features that the software must have and perform. Next, we design -- define general structure of the software system and essential operational units. Then it goes making up a program itself. At the next stage we test software, i.e. we check workability of what we made. Then it goes release and running, but it isn’t the end. Then we support and maintain the system. To support and maintain is to fix errors that will be found by users during running software in real conditions. And then, if engineered software appears successful and really needed (and might be not!), it goes creating of a new version. The whole process starts from the very beginning.

It looks like constructing a new model of car, doesn’t it? But, indeed, there are some differences. That has the joys as well as the sorrows.

First and foremost -- we don’t work with cement, metal or with something like that. Software during development process is a thoroughly mental structures. Thereby, the source material for work is very flexible and very pliant. That material doesn’t have any constraints -- neither chemical properties nor physical laws. There are no constraints at all. On the contrary, interconnections between mental abstractions and ideas might be very complex, they might be in a great number and they often might be very unobvious. And, if a taken approach to developing a software system lacks intelligence, care, accuracy and a good taste, one day some innocent change may cause that something falls off in another place. We saw it not once :))

The immateriality of our subject of work sometimes effects that customers behaves rather strange. Not all customers realize that a software system is a construction like a house, for instance. It occurs to no one to change foundations under a built house because a sad destiny of that house after changing is obvious. It occurs to no one to carry windows in a built house from one place to another; it occurs to no one to shorten a built house by a couple of floors; in occurs to no one to turn a built house over. In our job it happens pretty often; a customer usually doesn’t understand or doesn’t want to understand that a program system has foundations and withdrawal or changing them causes total crash of a system.

But, as a general rule, a customer pays money, so we have to deal with those issues. Usually after such changes something breaks down in another place. Though it may happen because an engineer didn’t take into consideration (or didn’t take the trouble to do) some unobvious interconnections between components. As a result, users form the opinion that any change is always leading to some kind of a breakdown… or to a total crash, if engineers don’t have luck :)). And we have to listen users complaints when they call to technical support.

Software development involves a much of creative work; an elegant, original solution of a complex nontrivial problem can bring aesthetic pleasure and joy of creation. But it involves a lot of routine and exhausting work that claims to take an attention to many details. It involves fixing errors and dealing with users and it is not necessary pleasant, especially when the errors aren’t made by you and the user feels annoyance or angry.