> As the use of AC spread rapidly with other companies deploying their own systems, the Edison Electric Light Company claimed in early 1888 that high voltages used in an alternating current system were hazardous, and that the design was inferior to, and infringed on the patents behind, their direct current system.
> In the spring of 1888, a media furor arose over electrical fatalities caused by pole-mounted high-voltage AC lines, attributed to the greed and callousness of the arc lighting companies that operated them.
Not surprising at all. He was a minor player in the Current Wars compared to his primary benefactor, George Westinghouse. His image was rehabilitated first by Serbian-Americans and then by webcomic artists and Redditors, who turned him into a secular saint.
Most of what people think they know about Tesla is not actually true if you examine the historical record. But software engineering as a discipline demands business villains and craftsman heroes, and so Edison and Tesla were warped to fit those roles even though in real life there is only evidence of cordial interactions.
How much trust was there in electricity, flight and radioactivity when we discovered them?
Not much.
Plenty of people were against electricity when it started becoming common. They were terrified of lamps, doorbells, telephones, or anything else with an electric wire. If they were compelled to use these things (like for their job) they would often wear heavy gloves to protect themselves. It is very occasionally mentioned in novels from the late 1800's.
(Edit: If you'd like to see this played out visually, watch the early episodes of Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries on ABC [.oz])
There are still people afraid of electricity today. There is no shortage of information on the (ironically enough) internet about how to shield your home from the harmful effects of electrical wires, both in the house and utility lines.
Flight? I dunno about back then, but today there's plenty of people who are afraid to fly. If you live in Las Vegas for a while, you start to notice private train cars occasionally parked on the siding near the north outlet mall. These belong to celebrities who are afraid to fly, but have to go to Vegas for work.
Radioactivity? There was a plethora of radioactive hysteria in books, magazines, comics, television, movies, and radio. It's not hard to find.
I use it to mean that the more people trust each other, the quicker things get done. Maybe the statement can be rephrased as "progress happens at the speed of trust" to avoid the specific scientific connotation.
Importantly, there are many business processes today that are already limited by lack of trust. That's not necessarily a bad thing either - checks and balances exist for a reason. But it does strongly suggest that increasing "productivity" by dumping more inputs into the process is counter-productive to the throughput of the overall system.
Trust is also essential for any form of symbolic information exchange.
Humans communicate using symbols. That could be patterns of sound waves, gestures, or written characters.
If we can't trust that the communicated symbols match their agreed meaning, what is the use of them? Communication breaks down quickly, and being social individuals which inter-depend on others, we can't live without communication. Nobody likes a liar, and the reason is, the words they give us do not match what they mean. (Perhaps not only humans. I read that dolphins readily come and rescue individuals which are drowning - including humans - but they punish individuals which fake drowning.)
And that goes from every stratum of social interaction, from big treaties to selling a bagel. Would you sell a bagel for a fake dollar bill? The number on it is a symbol as well, it has a meaning.
So it is right down one of the very bases of human cooperation.
I use it to mean that the more people trust each other, the quicker things get done.
True not only in innovation, but in business settings.
I don't think there's anyone who works in any business long enough who doesn't have problems getting their job done simply because someone else with a key part of the project doesn't trust that you know what you're doing.
You're not catching on. It's not the trust in the technology, it's the trust between people. Consider business dealings between entities that do not have high trust - everything becomes mediated through lawyers and nothing happens without a contract. Slow and expensive. Handshake deals and promises kept move things along a lot faster and without the expense of hammering out legal arrangements.
LLM leads to distrust between people. From TFA, That concept is Trust - It underpins everything about how a group of engineers function and interact with each other in all technical contexts. When you discuss a project architecture you are trusting your team has experience and viewpoints to back up their assertions.
You'll have to elaborate on that. How much trust was there in electricity, flight and radioactivity when we discovered them?
In science, you build trust as you go.