Comment by rootusrootus
7 months ago
There was a time when we would have said something similar for table saws that cannot cut off your finger. Might be a little harder to pull off the trick with a hammer, but it just seems like another engineering problem. And it would make for a very expensive hammer.
It probably wouldn't be classified as a hammer anymore. You're comparing apples and oranges. Now when you show me the manual hand saw that can avoid cutting off your fingers you'll have an accurate comparison.
Because we're not comparing air nailers or electric nail guns or screw guns. It was about a hammer.
Your comparison is so ridiculous because the table saw did not obsolete any other kind of saw. It was only a new type of saw that allowed for some types of sawing to be done much easier.
I'll bite, I guess.
The saw stop wasn't a replacement for manual saws. Table saws existed (and still exist!) and have a nasty habit of removing people's fingers. The saw stop was designed as a better table saw.
The point being that it's wild to start with the idea that hammers must be a danger to thumbs, and then double down by trying to claim that any hammer that wasn't a danger to thumbs wouldn't be called a hammer. Getting a table saw with a saw stop on it doesn't make it not a table saw.
But table saws are a replacement for manual saws. Table saws weren't invented first. Table saws fulfilled a niche use case for sawing. So by that saw stop is a replacement for a manual saw.
If you've ever used a hammer, a tool that has been around for tens of thousands of years, you will know by it's very nature of its operation it is a danger to thumbs. Trying to think that you can do "on an iPhone" and start with the assumption that a hammer fulfilling the functions and utility that it has and has had for 10,000 years cannot be a danger to thumbs is an erroneous thought and it shows the height of hubris.
Can you have tools that fulfill some of the functions of the hammer that are not dangerous to thumbs? Absolutely and we have those already. Any of the automatic nailers have built-in safety features to prevent accidents. Sometimes people disable those safety features because they do cause problems in legitimate use cases but they are built with those safety features. This would be analogous to saw stop which works in table saws which is a very limited saw.
Just like a table saw cannot fulfill all of the functions of a hand saw. A device that pounds nails or other things that has features to prevent it from accidentally hitting thumbs would not be able to fulfill all of the functions of the hammer.
From what we've seen with saws, this is your example not mine, all of the electric saws that have ever been built have never been able to eliminate the usefulness or utility of the simple handsaw which is dangerous to use. So where is the hubris to say that because you can invent a safer nailing device, which they have, it will somehow supplant and replace the hammer? The evidence says that's not the case.
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