Fun fact:

> Most of the flaws in the design of RBMK-1000 reactors were corrected after the Chernobyl accident and a dozen reactors have since been operating without any serious incidents for over twenty years. [99]

Including 3 remaining reactors of Chernobyl Power Plant itself.

[99] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RBMK

But Windows 7 was just Windows Vista with some relatively minor changes and it was fine.

The problem with the 737 MAX is that Boeing tried to make a plane with a completely different airframe and added a bunch of software to try to make it fly exactly like second generation 737s so that pilots didn't need to retrain. But the abstraction was leaky and it turns out that when you have a different airframe, you have to retrain your pilots.

That said, Boeing did some janky stuff to get this nonsense certified by the FAA and the whole design probably needs to be recertified, which will take years.

> The problem with the 737 MAX is that Boeing tried to make a plane with a completely different airframe

You've got it backwards. The problem was that they used the same airframe with larger engines that had to be mounted differently due to ground clearance issues.

Windows Me was probably a better example but not everyone will remember it.

Anyhow, the point is that scrutinizing a bad architecture doesn't make it any better. Scrutinizing a chicken won't make it an eagle.

I worked at a help desk when Windows ME came out. As I recall, the most salient difference I found between it and XP was that they removed a bunch of tools that I had come to rely on for diagnosis, troubleshooting, and just generally understanding what was going on under the hood. I guess it was ostensibly better, but I never did feel as comfortable working with an ME box.

With that in mind, yeah, Windows ME sounds like a pretty great analogy.

But ME came out before Windows XP..

Yeah, brain fart. I was thinking 98.

No, that reactor had an inherent instability that could not be fixed.

The MCAS has an issue with redundant AOA sensors; that specifically needs to be fixed. The MCAS caused problems on other flights, but the pilots knew to disable it by flipping the circuit breaker. The pilots on the crashed planes did not know to disable it. That is a training issue.

Fix the redundant AOA and provide training to disable the MCAS, and it will be fine.

The positive void coefficient problem[1] was intractable (without putting the whole reactor vessel inside a pressurized tank), but it was the combination of that and the control rod design that caused the explosion. The control rods were modified trivially. The reactor is basically safe, though you wouldn't repeat the design choices.

[1] An IMHO stupidly obfuscated way of saying that the cooling water around the reactor was an unpressurized pool that would boil if it got hot. Low-density bubbles of steam absorb fewer neutrons than liquid water, so when it boils the core gets hotter, not cooler.

> No, that reactor had an inherent instability that could not be fixed.

There are many exactly same reactors as was in Chernobyl fixed and running still:

> Most of the flaws in the design of RBMK-1000 reactors were corrected after the Chernobyl accident and a dozen reactors have since been operating without any serious incidents for over twenty years.

Even Chernobyl itself had 3 remaining reactors working for many years after the disaster, last decommissioned in 2000.

>No, that reactor had an inherent instability that could not be fixed.

Interesting maybe could have been fixed with software. I am thinking of Reactor Characteristics Augmentation System, or RCAS.

Also, Chernobyl exploded because they pressed the halt button at a very bad time. This also sounds like something that can be fixed in software.

Little known fact: Chernobyl was still a functional power plant after the meltdown and the remaining 3 reactors in the building were operated until 91, 96, and 2000.

Ten plants of same design are still operational today.