INDUSTRIAL AND ENGINEERING CHEMISTRY
EDITORIAL
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On Technical Thinking Or,j u s t how
does one approach a problem?
n our feature articles this month, two very different definitions of, O n the one hand, our approach to technological utilization of membranes for separation processes (pages 18-35) represents a combined fundamentalpragmatic attack on a new area of understanding and capability. O n the other, our extensive use of asphalt-passed down from antiquityrather than products of modern R&D (pages 45-75) indicates a far more empirical level of technical activity. At first glance, there arises the possibility that the difference lies within the basic differences between applied chemistry and chemical engineering. Except during the very recent past, applied chemistry has tended to be descriptive, while engineering tends to be a combination of broader intellectual and empirical efforts. Chemical correlations seem to an engineer to be highly specific and ungeneralizable; engineering correlations seem to the chemist to be unwarrantedly farreaching and inaccurate. But the cutting edge of progress seldom plays favorites among the various avenues of approach to gaining knowledge. Every attempt to date to develop a general statement about how to attack technical problems to ensure a high probability of success has been found to be incomplete. The “scientific method” and the “engineering approach,” as two of these, are therefore very general principles that are exceedingly difficult to describe or define in this context. One is almost forced to the conclusion that knowledge is everywhere and that the key to unlocking the secret of its use can lie anywhere. This is another way of saying that there is rarely a single, pat answer to any technical question. The critical thought or fact that opens the way to solution of any given problem can come from fundamental science or practical experience, frorn studied application of physical principles or from intellectual flashes of intuition. For any technical mind, therefore, a basic question is where to look for the facts and thought processes that may bear on the problem. There is, it seems, no valid, dependable way that one can direct his quest into channels with predictable results. This is not to say, however, that no generalizations about this quest pertain. Some obviously do. “ I t is necessary to think complexly about complex matters,” says Dr. G. Bruce Dearing of State University of New York a t Binghamton. Is there any difference in intellectual and philosophical nature between a line of poetry, a bar of music, and the molecular and atomic substructures of matter, he asks. Returning to asphalt, in order to keep a hold on reality, is its basic acceptance as a protective material the result of effective technological thought? O r is it primarily the remnant of a bygone era in which necessity dictated that a response-an empirical, immediate responseto pressing needs be obtained? And is there a lesson for membrane technology in the fact that, despite the great fund of fundamental insight, it has yet to make significant inroads into operations, while asphalt, despite its large areas of uncertainty and ignorance, holds a do:ninant commercial position?
I and approaches to, the pursuit of excellence are implied.
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