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Comment by lfuller | Hacker News Reader

They did, finally, but it shouldn't have taken this long. There was a breakdown on the regulatory side for decades.

"Do no harm at all costs" regulatory bodies need to be overhauled. E.g. NRC, FAA

IMHO, it'd be much better to have an explicitly adversarial and separately-funded dual-track system at such agencies, similar to how the justice system works.

E.g. FAA-Innovation (responsible only for their goal) makes their strongest case and presents research on why unleaded gas should be adopted ASAP. FAA-Safety (responsible only for their goal) makes their strongest case on why no change should be made.

All arguments and facts are published in public. Then higher-level decision makers arbitrate and make a call.

The root of all evil is that from a career perspective, "defer and take no action" is always safer for individuals in positions of regulatory authority. Worst case, something that's always been wrong explodes, and you blame it on the last person.

In the current blended safety+innovation system, it's too easy to obfuscate intentional inaction in endless "more study is needed" bullshit.

I've often thought about an evolutionary model of organizations, in which a challenge is presented, an A/B test is created, an the winning process would win out over the loser, making the organization more effective over time.

Having written this, it almost seems like too obvious of an idea to even post about...

I worked at HubSpot for a year before their IPO and a year after. They used this approach of basically spinning up multiple different teams in different orgs to solve more or less the same problem.

For example, before they figured out how to sell and onboard SMBs, there was at least three teams working on solving that problem while I was there, including mine.

Once there was a “winner”, that team would get more funding (aka budget) and the people on the other teams tended to be absorbed into the winning team or would be repurposed onto other projects.

This wasn’t a codified, explicit operating system, but basically is how they worked for awhile (but I’m unsure how it works now.) The gist was to hire smart people and let them figure it out.

The "separately-funded dual-track" is already there - It's the EPA, or congress. The FAA's mandate is to ensure safe flight. it shouldn't be up to them to be setting environmental rules. Environmental rules should be set for them, and they should figure out how their industry can meet those rules.

The exemption for leaded fuel in GA should have expired a long time ago. It's ridiculous that the FAA was allowed to keep punting this issue essentially forever, and the only reason a transition is happening now is because they finally decided to take responsibility for it, rather than because there was any legal requirement for it.

The FAA would have been totally happen, probably ecstatic, to allow an external mandate from someone like the EPA end leaded avgas while they had no replacement, effectively killing general aviation. They could have pointed fingers at the EPA who would have pointed back at the FAA, meanwhile GA would be dead.

yeah, that's always the threat - "following basic environmental safety rules will kill ____". but just because you say it, doesn't make it true.

GA flying is important for a lot of industry, and a lot of remote communities. it might have taken some work, but they could have found a way to use unleaded fuel in airplanes in fewer than 50 years.

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