You keep referring to working in an engineering field where lives are at stake and therefore no guesswork is involved. Can we dispense with that fallacy?
Let’s take an air launched missile as an example - certainly lives are at risk. Air to air or air to ground present the same or similar variables that need to be accounted for and to suggest that every permutation is tested and the outcomes fully known isn’t reality. While many are tested for, most combinations are rationalized based on “guesses” made via our current knowledge of the science involved.
To intimate that all scenarios are fully understood and accounted for would require all possible permutations of the following to be tested - I fully acknowledge that this is not the complete list. Temperature, atmospheric pressure, wind speed, humidity, continuous and variable wind shear, airborne particulate type, airborne particulate volume, and numerous others.
Then, every possible permutation of that list would need to be tested against every situational and operational variables, including pressure waves and temperature gradients resultant from other ordinance in the area of operations, physical and electronic countermeasures, and many more - that should be a long enough list to make the point.
In reality, there are actually far fewer environmental variables in USB data transport than the scenario described above. While neither are fully permutationally tested, both are based on enough known science to be rationally assessed and for reasonable conclusions/outcomes to be determined. At some point, finite data sets require exception based programming to account for unknown conditions/variables. Or more basically stated, guesses to be made based on the best information available. If and when new information is available, change may be required.
