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Quote:

Originally Posted by Cubdriver (Post 933316)

My thoughts on this run along two lines. They are:

1. These kinds of questions are junk science as far as I can tell. If they want to use junk science to eliminate job applicants there are easier and better methods (draw straws, good looks, nepotism, etc.) They aren't going to learn anything from poorly-administered pseudo psychology. The way the OP gave the scenario the "bizarre" questions one might encounter would be given by people who are not psychologists in an environment that is not controlled according to scientific method which is what the typical face to face job interview is. If the testing was supported by rigorous, proven science that would be another thing. I know of such testing and have no issue with it if it is really helpful.

2. I am generally opposed to any company using industrial psychology to control me. Having a company getting inside the head of its employees smacks of invasion of personal rights. It is the same argument that gets going in other areas of public life, such as how much does the NSA (National Security Agency) need to know about the average citizen in order to keep a grip in terrorism? Do they need to know every thought, read every text, read every email, and put every curious event on a watchlist? Should they be allowed to implant RFID tags in anyone they happen to suspect? You get my point, it is a serious and debatable question of personal rights versus the public interest, or in this case the company interest. A person has rights and the inside of their own head should be somewhat private. As soon as I see an industrial psych tests coming my way I generally run for my rights and I urge others to as well.

100% agree.

Most random question I ever got was, "How many gas stations are there in the United States?" Airline management job interview at a major. Still got the job offer which I turned down, but that question alone (along with the condescending, patronizing manner in which it was asked) destroyed my respect for the company. If they want to play little screwy games with you in the interview, damn, imagine what you may have to put up with on a daily basis working there.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vagabond (Post 932942)

Will an airplane weigh less if half the people on it go to the lavatory and pee?

Where are the wastewater holding tanks located at in relation to the CG? If you are transfering weight (pee and blue juice) into a holding tank that is aft of the aircraft CG, then that should reduce the amount of tail-down force required to offset the natural nose-down moment created by the CG being forward of the center of pressure on the airfoil.

In basic aerodynamics, when in straight and level unaccelerated flight isn't total lift assumed to = total weight? Total lift must support not only the weight of the aircraft and all its contents which is "focused" at the CG, but also overcome the balancing effects of the tail down force.

If people going to the lavatory to pee results in the CG moving aft, and less tail down force is required, has that not reduced the "total" weight of the aircraft?

Quote:

Originally Posted by trent890 (Post 933544)

Yes, but usually when someone asks about "weight" they are actually asking about "mass". And for those of you that are not engineers, this discussion about lift=weight and mass vs weight is just an acedimic play on words.

Not sure anyone asked, but mass is a measure of the amount of material in an object independent of any gravity field, while weight is a consequence of mass occurring in connection with a gravity field (Earth, Moon). Something has a set mass no matter where it is, but if it goes from the Earth to Moon its weight will vary. The difference becomes academic when the location is set, and we consider variation within a field like the Earth's gravity field to be trivial most of the time although it does vary quite a bit.

Earth's gravity field wiki article

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cubdriver (Post 933686)

Yes, exactly, and based on the discussion, people are actually talking about mass, however, as most people do, they are using the word weight. So when it was mentioned that the weight would actually change because the lift required would change because the center of gravity changed, then that person was talking about actual weight as a force, rather than weight having it's common meaning which actually represents mass.
So those who said that the weight does not change were correct, as long as they were using the term weight to mean "if you put the plane on a scale at rest", and the term weight was used for the amount of downward force exerted by gravity, the the weight changed.
Usually, when most of the engineers I know talk about this, they use the terms mass and weight, but most non-engineers tend to use these two terms interchangeably and without understanding the difference.

Mass? weight? unladen swallow??? My head hurts.

Quote:

Originally Posted by vagabond (Post 932942)

Here is one I asked a great Captain at Alaska, whereupon he just stared at me. Silly boy.

Will an airplane weigh less if half the people on it go to the lavatory and pee?

So what's the answer that you are looking for to this question, vagabond? Is the question asked in reference to "weight" or "mass" as the previous posters have now pointed out the differences between? Are we talking about the obvious and straightforward answer, or is there a twist that will cause a paradigm shift in our thought processes?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Cubdriver (Post 932938)

I think if someone asked me a question like this at an interview I would tell them they failed psych screening for my prospective employers, but thanks for your time and I will be on my way.

...guess this isn't a 'drug free' environment, eh...?

I guess you could always turn it around at the "do you have any questions for us?" point in the interview: "So would you rather be a drop of sweat on Santa's forehead or an armpit hair on Rudolph? ...Explain your answer"

Quote:

Originally Posted by ryan1234 (Post 940567)

.I guess you could always turn it around at the "do you have any questions for us?" point in the interview: "So would you rather be a drop of sweat on Santa's forehead or an armpit hair on Rudolph? ...Explain your answer"

Sweat on Santa, he's the CA. Rudolph is a propulsion/navigation device.

A problem I see these days with the corporate workplace is how impersonal it is becoming. Industrial psychology is a large reason for this. Performance management programs help out the weaker managers by giving them some tools they can use to manage their people, but they also get between the floor managers and their workers in a fundamental way and undermine their freedoms. The best industrial psychology (IP) can do is engender an impersonal, homogeneous, stifling bureaucracy and the worst it can do is engender an Orwellian conformal regime that stifles personal creativity. I have been in a bunch of engineering departments over the years and some of my superiors joked openly about the IP bit and made it clear we were simply connecting dots for upper management. Those were by far also the best departments in my opinion. They communicated effectively without the IP interference.