Here’s a photo I took of the last plane I flew in, heading to a medical advisory board meeting for a healthcare digital startup in San Francisco.
Now, take a close look at the wing. Thanks to my prior engineering and physics degrees, I have a pretty good feel for the fluid dynamics related to flight: the Equation of Continuity and Bernoulli’s Principle. These are the equations that show that if you have sufficient velocity (generated by the thrust of two of those big engines), then you will create a vertical pressure differential along the wings which will cause a net upwards force i.e., fly.
But that plane is also composed of about 600,000 individual parts, and its flight control software consists of several million lines of code—parts of a plane and its systems which I know nothing about. Effectively, I don’t know what is in a plane, yet I am still pretty comfortable getting on one.
That’s why I struggle with people who are afraid of getting a Covid vaccine because they “don’t know what is in it.”
Haven’t they ever flown in a plane?