Tokubetsu Juyo 2016 Results

[Darcy]

The 2016 Tokubetsu Juyo shinsa is over and the results have been published to the NBTHK website.

 

http://www.touken.or.jp/pdf/2016-04-27.pdf

 

I did a quick transliteration of what is there. I missed one item of kodogu but the rest should be ok.

 

http://nihonto.ca/tokuju-2016.html

 

At least five blades owned by foreigners (non-Japanese) passed. This is just what I have picked up from my own clients and from the gossip circle. So that already is pretty good. 

 

Three on the list were items I sold to my clients as Tokuju candidates so I am pleased with the result and will pat myself on the back a bit. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Brian]

Reading that list makes the heart flutter just a little bit. Wow....look at those names!

 

Just a tiny extract..

 

1. Soshu Yukimitsu
   katana (mumei)
2. Soshu Masamune
   naginata naoshi (mumei)
3. Soshu Masamune
   tanto (shumei)
4. Soshu Sadamune

[Ray Singer]

Interesting. Is that the only naginata-naoshi attributed to Masamune? I recall that there was a Norishige naginata-naoshi Ju-to offered by Seikeido a few years back, but I don't recall ever seeing an example placed with Masamune. Is the Akihiro which passed the former Juyo Bijitsuhin that was discussed here last year?

 

Best,

Ray 

[Pete Klein]

DB -- The one you missed:  一 、 松 上木 莵 図 鐔  無 銘甚 五  Basically a pine tree motif tsuba by (mumei) Jingo.  I find this to be quite interesting as it does not mention the generation and the shodai is referred to as Jinbei with the nidai on referred to as Jingo therefore, this is apparently by a later generation so it must be really something to see.

[John A Stuart]

It would be nice to see these with Darcy's photography to illustrate them. John

[Pete Klein]

Yup -- and I'd pay admission to be there for the shoot!

 

One day I would like to find someone who has the whole set of Juyo and TB Juyo catalogs who also has a penchant for sake...!  I'm buying !!!LOL

[Jean]

Interesting, Bizen which accounts for 50% of the Koto blades scores around one third of the tokuju, Yamashiro scores 20%, at more than 90% blades which pass tokuju were Koto...

[Darcy]

Thanks Pete, I will amend my list (now fixed).

 

Masamune: this naginata naoshi I remember from about 12 years ago, it sold for around $600,000. There is only one. The setsumei on the back was a bit uncertain on the attribution but said it was top Soshu work. Color me a bit surprised but there you have it. The alternate would be Shizu for this style I think. Norishige has six Juyo naginata naoshi.

 

The Akihiro I originally thought was the Jubi one, but didn't remember it passing Juyo in the last session (it will pass for sure, I don't think it was submitted yet). I think instead it is one of the early Juyo, it's dated "Oan san" (Akihiro has a habit of not using the month or day in his dating sometimes). The blade looks healthy and is something that would qualify. 

 

Pretty sure this is the Masamune as there is only one:

 

 

I think this is the Akihiro:

 

[Gunome]

Thanks Darcy for the list.

What I noticed is that there is only 3 wakizashi. No yari, naginata... Only katana, tanto and tachi.

[Darcy]

Thanks Darcy for the list.

What I noticed is that there is only 3 wakizashi. No yari, naginata... Only katana, tanto and tachi.

 

 

Here's the primer on Tokubetsu Juyo. First, it's supposed to be the model of the "best of the best". Quoting Tanobe sensei "it's the upper half of Juyo Bijutsuhin." The smith's reputation, the health of the blade, especially in areas we may overlook (boshi and niku) is extremely important.

 

Period is also very important as you can see in this issue 92% were koto. 8% were shinto. 0% were shinshinto.

 

Naginata are often as well made as swords so pass but they are rare to find in older periods. Yari are not usually as well made so they don't tend to pass so well. Only one ever went. For a long time these were also considered disposable so a good record of old yari and naginata is hard to come by.

 

Tanto, many master smiths of the Kamakura period worked in tanto primarily so we see a lot of tanto.

Wakizashi are generally a Shinto thing. They do pass for smiths like Sukehiro, Kotetsu, etc. who may have taken a special order from a rich merchant and so made lights out work. Before the Shinto period a ko-wakizashi in Soshu style is the kind of thing that is completely fine to pass. But a tachi shortened into a wakizashi is a really big modification so removes something that's very important in passing Tokuju: sugata.

 

Everything is a balance of the merits and ideally everything is perfect or as close as possible, then there is a competitive aspect where you need to beat out others in order to get in. There is some balance of Yamato to Yamashiro to Bizen etc. and there is some balance of Koto to Shinto. 

 

Some facts:

 

1. Katana (mumei suriage tachi and zaimei katana) are 40% of what pass

2. tachi are 30%

3. tanto are 11%

4. wakizashi are 7% (and these are mostly nanbokucho type things)

 

After this are koshirae and tsuba with everything else really being small and exceptional.

 

Looking at the data another way:

 

1. Kamakura are 48%

2. Nanbokucho are 23%

3. Edo are 10%

4. Heian are 6%

5. Momoyama are 7%

6. Muromachi are 4%

 

Edo is bumped up by the fact that tosogu are mostly Edo.

 

Everything else is split... Kofun stuff passes but is so rare to find so it's small. Meiji can pass if it is extreme.

 

So your ideal item to submit is a signed Kamakura tachi by a well known smith. 

 

In general they are looking for true archetypes of some sort and Edo wakizashi is not something very high on the list. I try to learn from this and model what I do based on what they're putting emphasis on. 

 

It's not about a nice blade, it's about the most important out of the important blades. My Yukimitsu passed this year as it is a dead ringer for Shintogo work and is very healthy with excellent niku and great activity and jihada. It also tells a story which shows that Yukimitsu learned this style which is based on Awataguchi from Shintogo and this happens before the midareba Soshu revolution. 

 

Picking Juyo is hard but picking Tokuju is harder. It needs to really abandon the "nice sword" thoughts that pervade people's imaginations about why something is a candidate. It can be nice as you want but it's not what they're looking for. Important is important, so the best smiths will dominate Juyo. When you get to Tokuju levels the best of the best dominate the rest.

 

What follows below is a tradition chart of Juyo vs. Tokuju works. Koto Bizen dominates both, being almost 30% of Juyo but it's 41% of Tokuju. So the best of the best tends to be Bizen. This is also though based on frequency: there are a lot of Bizen masterpieces to pick from. 

 

Soshu is 10% of Juyo but is 15% of Tokuju. So while Bizen has a 33% boost going into Tokuju, Soshu has a 50% boost. This implies that Soshu is quite rare but punches very high at Tokuju. Yamashiro also boosts , 12% of Juyo up to 17% of Tokuju.

 

What this tells people is that the three main areas of the peak importance are Bizen, Soshu and Yamashiro schools.

 

Yamato on the other hand falls from 9% of Juyo to 5% of Tokuju. The work is not competitive when you raise to filter for the top works. Shinshinto falls from 2% of Juyo to 0.18% of Tokuju. A 10x drop. Shinto is 14% of Juyo but 8.7% of Tokuju. 

 

It tells you if you want to seek the best swords for collecting, you concentrate on Bizen, Yamashiro and Soshu koto. If you keep the quality up you will increase your chances too that they will go higher in terms of papers. But this shouldn't be about papering, it's about what the top experts think are the most important things. It is kind of a money is no object thing to be talking about great Bizen, Yamashiro and Soshu smiths but that is the thought, that if you are to pursue greatness, this is where it's concentrated, as together they represent 72% of all the Tokuju that pass.

 

What you need to take home from this is that most Edo wakizashi don't really register in the top brackets as art items. Muromachi is also hard as is Shinto and Shinshinto. Exceptional pieces in all of these will also be exceptional pieces period. Of the Gokaden there is a clear heirarchy and that is Bizen, Soshu and Yamashiro at the top, Yamato and Mino and then Majiwarimono (hard to classify), and Shinto below. At the bottom, Shinshinto. In terms of how we view importance. 

 

[Darcy]

PS. now that's a research chart.

[Gunome]

Thanks for all that explanations.

[Jamie]

 

Thanks Darcy

[Derek]

Thanks for all your time and effort.

[Alan F]

Wow! I had no idea that there would be so many items that would pass to Tokuju in one shinsa. 70 blades and 7 tosogu? How many more would have been submitted that failed?

 

That would be a total of about $232,000 USD in shinsa fees (more, if some submissions were made by non-members), just for the Tokuju shinsa. That wouldn't include the fees for swords that failed the shinsa.

 

It would be interesting to know how many items were submitted in total for Tokuju. How many of those were second or third time submissions?

 

I would also be curious to know how many items were submitted to the last Juyo shinsa in the fall of 2015, and how many of those did they pass?

 

We have all been told how difficult it is to get a Tokubetsu Hozon sword through to Juyo, and that two or three submissions may be required. Perhaps the same is not true for Tokuju submission? Perhaps having already attained Juyo status (which means that they are undoubtedly very good swords), Tokuju submission is a relative cakewalk.

 

Don't get me wrong. I am sure that all the blades that passed to Tokuju were exceptional candidates by very important smiths, but the reported number was an eye-opener to me. It just tends to give one the impression that they are really cranking them through.

 

Alan

[Darcy]

 

Don't get me wrong. I am sure that all the blades that passed to Tokuju were exceptional candidates by very important smiths, but the reported number was an eye-opener to me. It just tends to give one the impression that they are really cranking them through.

 

Alan

 

 

 

They have been doing Tokuju since 1972 and there are less than 1,000 swords accepted in total. There are around 100 tosogu accepted. If it were a "cakewalk" and they were "cranking them through" then these would not be the numbers now would they?

 

Tokubetsu Juyo represents the best sword out of every 13 Juyo roughly. 

 

An item that did not pass Juyo on the first try is never going to pass Tokubetsu Juyo. 

 

Every single sword submitted to this shinsa has been vetted by friends and dealers who have experience with Tokuju swords and know what the requirements are. Many have been passed through Tanobe sensei for sayagaki and have gotten his opinion on whether the blade is worthwhile to try to submit. 

 

Nobody is trying this unless they feel there is more than a break even chance to get one through. Yet the vast majority fail.

 

Very minor things can derail a sword from passing. Things that are not on the papers factor in. 25% of the blades that did pass Tokuju are known to have been in daimyo collections. This is vs. 5% of Juyo. The other 75% will be at a level sufficient to believe that they probably were in daimyo collections too. 

 

Major dealers will submit good candidates that they sat on for two years to have a chance to submit and have no success. I saw one such sword, almost two years ago, a fantastic Nanbokucho masterpiece in 100% health though suriage by a Sai-jo saku smith. This I was shown for kantei and nailed it and I asked to buy it. The dealer said "no papers" but that I had the right smith. He put it through lower papers and confirmed it as the guy we thought it was. He wouldn't sell it. It went to Juyo and passed on first submission easily. I asked if I could buy it now, he just smiled and shook his head. This is because he is thinking it will sail through Tokuju. Me too. Now, here are the results and it's not there. So now probably it will be available for sale as he won't want to wait another two years. This guy knows what he is doing and I mostly do as well. We're both surprised but that's how it is.

 

In 15+ years of fooling around with swords this is the first time I've ever heard anyone suggest that Tokubetsu Juyo is easy.

 

This is not a conclusion supported by any evidence, either in the items that passed as shown or in the count of items that have passed historically. This is not the largest session and this is not the smallest session. The NBTHK passes them it seems to reflect the total count of Juyo to continue to make Tokubetsu Juyo the "best of the best" category.

 

I know firsthand some amazing and important items that should have passed I felt but didn't. So does everyone else because nobody is submitting stuff they think doesn't stand a reasonable chance of passing. After they fail everyone always wants to know why they failed like there is something wrong with the blade, and the answer is usually "look at the stuff that passed" though there are always some head scratchers. 

[Brian]

Darcy,

How often do they do a TJ shinsa?

[Guido]

Darcy,

How often do they do a TJ shinsa?

 

I'm not Darcy  , but every other year, i.e. the next one will be in 2018, then 2020 and so on.

[Kronos]

Every 2 years Brian.

 

70 seems quite a lot at first glance until you take a look at what passed half of which you'd almost expect them to pass on the names alone. Zaimei Hatakeda Moriie for example is only ever going to be less than Tokuju if there's condition issues, then there's Masamune, the awataguchi's etc

 

The only question marks imho would the likes of the Kanemitsu's  and so forth that aren't quite at that level but you can only imagine they're the best examples.

 

Woe to me for a while ago I decided Koto Yamashiro, Bizen and Soshu would be my collecting focus before I found out it was everyone elses opinion that they were the best as well. Just one of those swords would be more than enough.

[paulb]

Hi James

I fully agree (and also have a similar focus, although not in the same order perhaps). As mentioned on another thread I was lucky enough to spend time with the late Michael Hagenbusch studying his collection. Believe it or not I went in to T.J. overload they just kept coming at me. Certainly without necessarily knowing what level of papers they had (there were also Juyo blades) Those with the higher designation certainly seemd to stand out over and above the rest. The just exuded high craftsmanship and quality.

[Jussi Ekholm]

Woe to me for a while ago I decided Koto Yamashiro, Bizen and Soshu would be my collecting focus before I found out it was everyone elses opinion that they were the best as well. Just one of those swords would be more than enough.

 

Funny how you worded it like that James. I mean ever since I was little I've been doing the crazy thing of picking one unattainable favorite from a list like this (picking a favorite without any limitations). So by just seeing the attribution/signature and basic measurements what would be your pick? I know it's crazy to pick a favorite without even seeing a single picture but at the same time it's quite fun. I knew what would be mine when I browsed through the list.

[Brian]

I'm not Darcy  , but every other year, i.e. the next one will be in 2018, then 2020 and so on.

Thanks. And that is also my point.

Saying "...the reported number was an eye-opener to me. It just tends to give one the impression that they are really cranking them through" is only really valid if you are seeing this many pass every few months. But in TWO years? That's a long time for people to discover/stockpile/save up for. That's only 2 swords every 3 weeks worldwide being stockpiled for this shinsa. I don't think that's a lot at all.

[myochin]

Darcy: thanks for the shisha results

 

Pete: here are the volumes I have

Jûyô Tôken Nado Zufu 重要刀剣等図譜 Volumes 第1-->38 + 40-->51
Tokubetsu Jûyô Tôken Nado Zufu 特別重要刀剣等図譜 Volumes 第1 --> 22 (yes, every single one)

You are welcome to bring the sake :-)

 

Paul

[myochin]

Darcy,

I see that these results are for the 24th session.

So far, only 22 TB Jûyô volumes have been published. Do you know if there was a Volume 23 (maybe sold out??)

 

Thanks

Paul

[Pete Klein]

Well Paul -- you might just have twisted my arm to the point of submission! 

[seattle1]

Hello:

 Thank you Darcy for the excellent presentation of the various cross-tabs represented in the latest Tokubetsu Juyo designations. It is really educational. The underlying strategy of starting with a Juyo set of options that have the highest pay off in terms of getting a Tokuju, which is derived from the leverage beyond that point exhibited by Kamakura and Nanbokucho Bizen, Soshu and Yamashiro swords, makes a lot of sense if Tokuju is the goal. There is a certain causal circularity, almost an identity problem between being in the population coming from those three groups on the one hand, and having certain characteristics for which those groups are noted on the other. There is no criticism, just an uncertainty in my mind, about the determinants that matter for sorting at the Tokuju level. Aside from the issue of what it is about blades in those three groups that are so qualitatively superior, in comparison say with Yamato and Mino (staying within the Gokaden paradigm), which could be an entirely different thread?  One feature that does seem to matter is connection with different Shogunal groups through time and of course with the Daimyo families. One hears that, in comparison with some of the other certification issuing groups, the art historical, particularly the "historical", matters a lot to the NBTHK, given some minimum level of qualitative perfection of the blade. Can we suppose that is so at the Tokuju level in particular?  Perhaps you would care to digress on just what makes the blades qua blades of Bizen, Soshu and Yamashiro so favored, though perhaps that has another place for consideration.

 Arnold F.

[Darcy]

For Paul, yes there is a Tokuju volume 23 out.

 

For Arnold, it's complex and I'm still thinking about the issue and have been studying it for 5-6 years. So this is not exactly a succinct response but more of a ramble of what I am thinking about.

 

The numbers can't be interpreted flat out as A is better than B. Things that have to be considered are:

 

Bizen scope is 600 years.

Yamashiro scope is 400 years.

Soshu scope (for all intents and purposes) is about 150 years.

Mino scope is 300 years.

Yamato scope is about 350 years (we believe it to be longer but this is generally what we see)

 

Because Bizen lasts so long, they get the benefit of longevity producing a large number of grandmaster smiths. That causes them to occupy a lot of volume in the counts. Yamashiro's customers were in Kyoto and high ranking people. Compared to Mino who were making blades for the average warrior in large armies in the Muromachi, there is going to be a quality difference just based on the customer. There is only one true Mino Tokuju work (by Nosada) because we should really consider Shizu to be a Soshu smith in his post-Masamune capacity. This really puts Mino in dead last. But all Muromachi branches of traditions are affected by the same wave: mass production being promoted vs. quality.

 

Bizen is also boosted because the Gokaden is an artificial construct. At the very least Bitchu should stand alone and that would deflate the numbers in a large way. 9% of the Tokuju came from Bitchu province. That is more than Yamato and Mino and Shinto and Shinshinto but it's only considered a subset of Bizen (without a really strong reason other than that they shared a border). So it's just a label and taking it away from Bizen evens things out more.

 

Time of production is a big factor, old blades are rare and not well preserved so if you do have one then it will have a great chance of being considered a very important blade. It's just more historically significant to have a 1000 year old mint condition blade than it is to have a 100 year old one. The 100 year old thing is commonplace and the 1000 year old one might not exist. Bizen and Yamashiro both benefit from the fact that they happened to exist in that 1000 - 1200 AD period. The others basically did not... for whatever reasons Yamato either we lost its pieces or we can't properly classify them (there are exceptions) going back that far. So they just lack the age factor that otherwise benefits them in being considered a top blade. 

 

I don't think these are biases, these are objective details. Yamashiro for the first 300 years is just a story of excellence. Sanjo, Gojo, Ayanokoji, Awataguchi and Rai. There would be more Tokuju if there were more survivors from these schools. You can add more survivors to Mino and Yamato and it won't necessarily make a difference because on a blade by blade basis the chances of a masterpiece are going to be higher in Yamashiro. This doesn't say that masterpieces don't exist in the others but I think it's mostly a factor of who the customer is and what was the ability to pay? 

 

Giving a monk who is defending your temple the equivalent of a Ferrari is not a good economic decision, nor is giving a Ferrari to a guy with very little training fighting the volume based wars of the Muromachi period. You want to give them something reasonable and functional and you stop there. Higher ranking guys get higher ranking weapons. If your customer base is basically the closed economy of a temple it's different vs. serving an open market of nobles or the warrior circle around the shogun. The fact that there  are extreme masterpieces in Yamato indicates that the top dogs in the temples did get their Ferrari. Just the average case is not. 

 

(We also see this in the tank battles between the Soviet Union and Germany... Germany tried to build the master tanks and these took a lot of resources and were tremendously armed and armored... tank for tank nothing could match them in the war. Soviets designed a pretty good tank with some advanced features like sloped armor but not usually well made, American advisors complained that the welds were crap and the build quality was low, but the Soviets just ignored them because the crews were getting a few hours of training, then sent to the front to get blown up after a couple more hours... your weld quality did not matter so much as your ability to put enough tanks in the field and win even if just by seeing the enemy run out of ammo. Stalin is quoted as saying "quantity has a quality all of its own"... and ultimately though the Germans destroyed 4 tanks for every 1 of their own the Soviets ended the war having produced something like 8 tanks for every 1 German so Stalin was right... that same economic decision that you don't arm your footsoldiers with the best quality weapon I think played out with the production of the Mino and Yamato smiths). 

 

Soshu smiths and Yamashiro smiths during the heydey of these traditions did not serve the average guy but they served elites, so the blades follow the pattern of who the intended customer was. 

 

Bizen is interesting because they marketed to everyone. And we see that in the output, there are schools within Bizen that won't ever see top ranked status. They weren't likely intended to be serving top ranked clients in these cases. 

 

Ford has all the capability if they want to make and compete with Ferrari but they concentrate on the mass market because the huge volume that's there is where the money is. When they dabble in the high end it's usually to create a marketing image for the rest of the brand. I look at the Mino smiths, many (most) of whom got there by way of Yamato and have Yamato roots, and this is what I see. Just a difference in the market. 

 

Elite markets made for elite swords. That's the end of what I see in the numbers when Soshu, Yamashiro, and Bizen take bigger chunks of the top ranked pie. Their output fit their markets and its especially true for Yamashiro and Soshu as we would expect since they were serving local power centers who had the money and desire to buy only the best. So I don't see it as someone now deciding they like Yamashiro so really promoting it at the expense of the others. I see it just as output matching markets.

 

What the blade really needs to pass Tokuju is:

 

1. great condition

2. historical importance

3. outstanding work

 

Historical importance means that the smith needs to be significant and the blade needs to be significant within his body of work. 

 

So Joe Average, his masterpiece won't cut it because he's not significant. On the other hand a real major smith, any particular work can actually be hurt by the reputation of the smith.

 

If you have a Masamune, you need to have an *outstanding* Masamune to pass Tokuju because it has to compete with the other Masamune blades, as well as all blades in general. For the most part just being a Masamune and getting that attribution means it has to reflect the best of the Soshu tradition.

 

There is no crap Masamune. It can't get that attribution if it's crap. It has to be head and shoulders over everything. 

 

In this sense a Juyo Masamune is most often going to be superior to a Tokubetsu Juyo Chogi for instance if you look at the quality and consider that the health is the same. Yet the Juyo Masamune just may not pass because other Masamune are more significant somehow and outcompete it. A famous blade, owned by a famous man, if you have one with no history then you have to compete against that. 

 

So the arch-smiths, one can't automatically think that they're going to go Tokuju or have better chances than a lower ranked smith. But if you go too low on the smith ranking then the smith isn't significant and it won't pass. And in this "passing" needs to be read as meaning "being considered a top ranked blade." It needs to compete in two dimensions, horizontally vs. other smiths and vertically vs. the smith in question.

 

To do otherwise would cause Tokuju to be too overly represented by a small set of smiths. Tokuju has to function as a library of sorts. This is why I think Shinto blades continue to get included though pound for pound they are out muscled by the koto masterworks. They need to be represented. Some of course are really fantastic swords and deserve to be there. 

 

But, should one necessarily care more about a Tatara Nagayuki in comparison with a Soshu Sadamune? The Sadamune may fail Tokuju and the Tatara Nagayuki may pass. I can tell you what the prices will be in the market and the Sadamune will surely cost more than the Nagayuki because the market has decided that one is far more significant. This is a different type of judgment. Nagayuki has a reputation significant enough to pass so all you need to do in that case is locate one of his best works and you're in. The worst of Sadamune will be better than the best of most other smiths, otherwise it would never get attributed to Sadamune in the first place. So in this sense we need to temper what being a top blade means, and realize that reputation is a double edged sword. 

 

To break down the swords completely qualitatively and objectively may be difficult because there is a matter of artistic merit and that is taste, and when taste is handed down it is culture. What we have to go on is going back to who the customers were. Yamashiro moulded itself to the needs of the aristocrats. It represents aristocratic taste. Soshu moulded itself to the needs of the warrior elites. It represents elite warrior taste. Mino moulded itself to the needs of fielding a huge number of people on the battlefield. So did Sue Bizen and to some extent Sue Soshu. So, we get just about what we would expect. The Yugos of the sword world belong in this spot though there are outstanding works still. Yamato moulded itself to the needs of the warrior monks and the economic decisions of arming them, with some works that seem intended for elites in the ranks and probably the leaders of the elites mixed in. So what we see in the output seems to follow that expectation quite well.

 

At the end of the day any given work just needs to stand on its own merit though. It's not possible to get to this level (in theory) without having that merit (I confess I don't always agree with the judgments and I'll admit that this only means I don't understand what they were trying to do, though I tend to believe a favor is granted here and there). So there is still room for an individual to come to their own conclusion. 

 

The matter of taste (to close up) is subjective. One can align oneself with what the elite monks thought was a superior work and feel completely fine about it. Or the Kyoto nobility... or the Kamakura generals. Mino will always have the bang for the buck. This isn't to denigrate Mino because there are obviously awesome works (Sue-Bizen being equivalent, same thing that most production is for dirty use and then mixed in there are masterpiece items for the elites of the time). Kanesada, Kanemoto, Yosozaemon Sukesada, etc. all stand out as being special. They are just surrounded though by the need to produce work at low cost. Stuff that didn't have to be used to kill demons or cut rocks. One can respect that too, minimum cost and minimum materials to solve the problem is the goal of every engineer and so the end of the Muromachi is where you get engineering magnificence. Engineers will say that anyone can build a bridge that won't fall down. The trick is to make a bridge that just barely stands up. From that sense if you were given all possible resources and time and assistance to make a masterpiece you should be able to. Give a guy a day and his own hands, basic materials and tools, and tell him to produce something utilitarian that will kill someone just fine and maybe it is a harder nut to crack? Something to think about. 

[John A Stuart]

Very nice read Darcy. John

[kissakai]

A wonderful very well defined explanation that I enjoyed reading

The tank analogy was brilliant

 

 

Thanks

Grev UK

[Darcy]

I wish I could tie those thoughts up into a bit better package but it's going to take a few more years of observations and thinking.