On Sun, 09 Jul 2006 19:15:34 -0400, "J. D. B."
wrote:

Al, someone who passes a code test should be more proficient in code
than someone who cannot pass the code test. That simply makes that
person proficient in code, not necessarily a more proficient operator.

The original claim wasn't that it makes him more proficient in
everything, just that it makes him a more proficient operator. Being
equal in everything else, but more proficient in code, makes one more
proficient.

Is logic a lost art?

You may be able to use the code, but if you cannot use modern digital
methods, use sat communication, able to handle emergency communication,
able to set up digital networks and use them effectively, build modern
solid-state equipment, etc., then you are not a more proficient amateur
operator, you just are more proficient in code and that is not going to
help us much in the 21st Century.

And, if there's effectively no testing, which is the current case, how
do you propose that we get operators who CAN "use modern digital
methods, use sat communication, able to handle emergency communication
....", etc? Wishing makes it so?

As I said before, PSK31 can be copied when the human ear cannot even
hear the signal, if you cannot hear code, you cannot copy it period.

CW can be copied below the noise. Whether it can be copied as far
below the noise as PSK31 can is a good question. With the amount of
experience I have with both modes, I think I can safely say that CW
can be copied further into the noise than PSK31 can. (You need SOME
detectable original signal for PSK31 to work - after all, you have to
be able to detect the phase shift. CW can be copied even if it's
nothing more than modulated noise. And, if there are any old sounder
operators left, even key clicks can be copied.)

So code is no longer the be-all-end-all. Modern 21st communication methods
have replaced it.

It never was all there is, but let's see you use "modern 21st
communication methods" in an emergency situation when all you have is
a source of RF - nothing to modulate it with. Going to yell at the
oscillator and hope it's microphonic enough to produce some NBFM?

If we are going to attract new people to the service, we need to get
into the 21st Century and get the old farts away from the old code and
tubes crap.

They said that in the 50s too - "we have modern communications like
SSB - who needs CW?" ... yet CW still lives. I doubt it'll be a
requirement in 100 years , but I also doubt that no one will be able
to copy it.