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Comment by tiahura | Hacker News Reader

The average age of NASA engineers on Apollo 11 was 28 https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/a4288/4318625/

You could almost make the argument that as these engineers hit their 40's they began mailing it in.

I wonder how Soviet engineer ages correlated to the the relative success of particular programs?

No. The engineers were at Grumman and North American Rockwell. You'd have to check with them. That article refers to flight dynamics officers in one large room, not engineers. There were thousands and thousands more.

They were indeed younger then. People chain smoked, had heart attacks without modern bypass surgeries, generally had larger families and more kids to take care of.

And Werner von Braun was 56 in 1968. You think he should have been replaced with somebody younger? Or do you think that his level of experience was useful?

Experience can be a double edged sword, as not all experience is good. There is probably no better example of this than the hiring of older, German, rocket engineers by the US at that time.

If Werner von Braun was younger he’d have been less likely to have been a career building nazi and SS member.

> The average age of NASA engineers on Apollo 11 was

I don't know the specifics but I would be willing to bet that those Engineers passed ethics courses that are required to get an Engineering degree and certificate.

...unlike software "engineers".

You think the engineers that build rockets have to take ethics courses? And furthermore, that the lack of ethics courses and similar red tape is a huge loss?

I'm happy to say it's definitely no on the first count and the second one is very subjective, but it's a strong no from me.

The OP used capital "E" engineering, so I'm assuming they may mean an ethics course for licensure, which is required in many states. With that said, I you generally aren't required to have an engineering license to work at NASA.

A different charitable take is that ethics courses are generally a recurring requirement for government employees. I'm not sure how much impact that has on actually ethical behavior.

IMO a 28 year old in 1968 was probably way more "mature" than a 28 year old now.

Perhaps, but what about innovation and ambition?

Those 28-year olds had pocket protectors though.

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