Quote:
Originally Posted by RobertSmalls
Nature produces some things that are highly optimized by tens of thousands of generations of trial-and-error. But unless you are building a whale, nature's solution may not be an optimal one.
Biomimetics is a source of some inspiration for novel innovations, but it also spawns loads and loads of gimmicky products. I would file dimpled/tuberculated fan blades under "gimmick". Dimpled fans have been around for a while, but they don't appear to offer any advantage, at least in small (4-12cm) fan and desk fan applications.
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I agree for the most part, but if you watch Janine's TED talk, I don't think she's dealing with gimmicks. She probably wouldn't make it onto TED with gimmicks.
Watch the TED talk. It starts slow, but when you see that a high speed bullet train is inspired by a Kingfisher, or next gen solar from photosynthesis, or desalination tech from our kidneys, these are
potentially radical solutions that we should have been watching all along.
Skeptical optimism