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Comment by bob1029 | Hacker News Reader

Analogies are the only thing that work in my family. If you can figure out a way to explain something in terms the audience already comprehends, you are on the right track.

If you have to build up "what the hell is an EUV machine?" from first principles, you are going to lose them somewhere around linear algebra.

If something seems difficult to explain, even with analogies, consider if you should abstract the concern away and say something handwavy like "that's wizard crap, don't worry about it. Just call me if this light turns red."

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Can you give an example of a successful analogy?

One analogy used to `explain' electricity is to compare it with (water) plumbing.

It's one of the best analogies. I usually use rivers, waterfalls, dams, rain to illustrate. Basically the water cycle and how humans manipulate it to do things.

I’m still trying to understand electricity in terms of wattage amperage and voltage and the water pipe analogy seems to break down. If you have a solid explanation I’d be delighted to hear/see it.

In this analogy, water in a pipe is electricity in a wire.

Volts: Water pressure. The higher the pressure, the more forceful it goes through, but you can have a large or small diameter pipe with high and low pressures. But water can be highly pressurized without actually moving.

Amps: Water flow rate. More amps means more water flowing through the pipe, per second.

Watts: Power of the water. Multiply the pressure by the flow rate to get this. Higher with more water flow (amps) and higher pressure (volts).

Could you expand this to appliances being measure in amps? Is this the resistance?

In a solar powered system with limited supply being able to power a limited amount of devices - how is that calculated? What is a mental model I can use for that?

If I'm discussing Apple TV, I'll start by using simple old-media analogies that stick, saying it's like Cable-VOD or a stack of video tapes by your TV. The important thing, I think, is that you have to (at least first) gloss over nuances. Then it is a matter of layering artful examples to try to cover what Apple TV does. It is like picking the right brushes (= small analogies) to paint a familiar scene, rather than constructing a consistent argument from first principles.

This is a nice analogy for 'explaining' in general; start with the familiar and layer in new concepts gradually (checking understanding).

Lego bricks as an example of software development with libraries/modules. I recently did a presentation on the topic :-)

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