美国宇航员的笔和日本肥皂流水线

姚鸿恩

这是个两个有关解决问题的著名案例，来自英文网站。我已经翻译成中文。你可以先看英文，再看中文；或者直接阅读中文。

Case 1
When NASA began the launch of astronauts into space, they found out that the pens wouldn't work at zero gravity (ink won't flow down to the writing surface).

To solve this problem, it took them one decade and $12 million. They developed a pen that worked at zero gravity, upside down, underwater, in practically any surface including crystal and in a temperature range from below freezing to over 300 degrees C.

And what did the Russians do...?? They used a pencil.

第一个案例

美国航空和宇宙航行局启动送航天员上太空的时候，发现圆珠笔在失重的情况下不能用（油墨不会流出到要书写的表面）。

为了解决这个问题，他们用了10年时间，花了1200万美元。他们研发了一种圆珠笔，在失重、倒过来、水里，而且几乎在任何表面，包括水晶表面，在零度到300度的情况下，都能书写。

俄国人怎么解决这个问题的呢？他们用的是

铅笔。

 
Case 2
One of Japan's biggest cosmetics companies received a complaint that a consumer had bought a soapbox that was empty. Immediately the authorities isolated the problem to the assembly line. Management asked its engineers to solve the problem. Post-haste, the engineers worked hard to devise an X-ray machine with high-resolution monitors manned by two people to watch all the soapboxes that passed through the line to make sure they were not empty.

But when a rank-and-file employee in a small company was posed with the same problem, he did not get into complications of X-rays, etc., but instead came out with another solution. He bought a strong Industrial electric fan and pointed it at the assembly line. He switched the fan on, and as each soapbox passed the fan, it simply blew the empty boxes out of the line.

第二个案例

一家公司，日本最大的化妆品公司之一，收到了一份投诉，一个顾客买的一盒肥皂，盒子里面是空的。公司上层马上将之归结为包装流水线问题。管理部门要求工程师解决此问题。工程师们火速辛劳工作，设计出一种爱克斯光机，带有高分辨率的监视器。由两个人监视所有经过流水线的肥皂盒，确保没有空盒。

但是，当一家小公司的普通雇员也碰到了同样的问题时，并没有搞得爱克斯光机那么复杂，而是用另一个方法来解决。他买了一台大功率的电风扇，对着包装流水线，打开电风扇。在肥皂盒经过流水线诗，空盒被吹出了流水线，就这么简单。

两个案例的启示或寓意（Moral）是：总是寻找简单的解决方案。想出最简单的可行的解决问题的方法。总是致力于“解决”而不是“问题”。（Always look for simple solutions. Devise the simplest possible Solution that solves the problem. Always focus on solutions & not on problems.）

显而易见，两个非常简单的解决方法节省了大量的金钱。

聪明的网友，现在请你也来解决一个问题：美国航空和宇宙航行局和日本的那家大公司，真的很笨吗？