mefi quotes, no 55 ~ historically speaking

[fiefoe]

IBM was hired by the Nazis to build a system for tracking (and eventually exterminating) the Jews.
posted by kaibutsu at 2:28 AM on October 28

WWII airplane mechanics who realized that the places that needed reinforcing on their bombers were the places where there were no bullet holes on planes returning from bombing sorties. This is because the places where the returning planes did NOT get hit were the places where planes that didn't return DID get hit and didn't survive.
posted by Salvor Hardin at 4:25 PM on November 8

“My absolute favourite piece of information is the fact that young sloths are so inept that they frequently grab their own arms and legs instead of tree limbs, and fall out of trees.”
— Douglas Adams
posted by sweetkid at 7:37 PM on January 31

not least of which because his anti-corruption measures hampered the efficiency of the black market.
posted by smoke at 5:47 PM on August 17

Or, with Milan Kundera: "Kitsch is a folding screen set up to curtain off death." It is denying the reality of our human temporality.
posted by mumimor at 7:43 AM on November 17

A long dead man says history doesn't repeat, but it does rhyme.
posted by rough ashlar at 6:51 AM on February 7

Leica introduced an entirely new camera design after the war because the Russians just picked up the old factory and took it home with them.
posted by b1tr0t at 8:19 AM on February 13

If the logistics could somehow be worked out, the Fifty could bench-press the battleship Iowa, with 860 tons to spare.
It is this power, combined with amazing precision—its tolerances are measured in thousandths of an inch—that gives the Fifty its far-reaching utility.

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