The Perfectionists
b'How a Couple of Nitpickers Designed the Modern World
Guest: Simon Winchester, author of "The Perfectionists: How Precisions Engineers Created the Modern World"
The millions of mechanical and electrical systems\\xa0we rely on to\\xa0drive a car, turn on a light, look at a webpage, or cook something all require precision. Simon Winchester spotlights a new way of thinking about precision that dates\\xa0to the 19th century, with the rise of steam-powered machines.
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The Wrong Foot
Guest: Michael Dennis, NOAA and NGS geodesist
For more than a century, America has been using two different measurements for the foot, but we\\u2019re finally dropping one, and the US will become 28.3 feet wider. How we got into this situation in the first place.'