[David Lyga]

Very understandable about the advancement of zoom optics and what I really thought: that this computerization of design was largely gradual, emanating (seminally) from 'helping' to calculate and verify the manual efforts, then gradually segueing into actually BEING the 'person' who formulates the data.

Might I ask another question: I heard long ago (two decades) that varifocal lenses were actually sharper than zooms because they had to be refocused with each change in focal length. Has the quality of today's zooms negated that 'advantage'? - David Lyga