Vintage Boots: Razors Vs Electric Shavers

Razors Vs Electric Shavers

Maybe some tools aren't old-fashioned. Maybe they're just perfect. The inevitable tapering toward only the necessary, the honing away of all distraction. The machine at its most simple. After that, what? Easy: mass production.

A razor is a wedge, one of physics' six force-multiplying "simple machines." Unlike the wedge used to split wood or hold a door open, a razor (and its father, the knife) do their work at their tip—the edge.

You know this intrinsically, but consider it again: The sharpest razor is just a few molecules wide at its edge, persuading the molecules it meets that it would be easier to decouple from their mates and let the razor pass through the space.