Brilliant

[cosmolinguist]

The first I heard about Nikola Tesla was when some people in my physics class were going to make a Tesla coil as a sort of after-school project. I didn't know what a Tesla coil was, so one of them told me, and even then I didn't know it was named after a person called Tesla. I didn't really think about it and if I had I probably would've thought it acceptable for "teslacoil" to be merely the name of something.

But when I did find out about Mr. Tesla, it didn't surprise me that Tesla coils would've been named after him. I still don't know much about him, but I did hear something on TV a couple days ago that made me like him.

It was a show about Niagra Falls, I guess--I was really bored, and there was nothing good on, and that's when I watch the History Channel, even though it's about something I consider boring, like Niagra Fals. This part of the show was about the falls being used to power a bunch of things, and about the rivalry between Edison and Westinghouse.

But before they got to that, they explained that Nikola Tesla was this guy who was walking around a park in Budapest or some place like that, reciting Goethe to himself, when suddenly he'd totally figured out the concept of alternating current. That's how they said it. He just invented this idea, all in his mind. Park, Goethe, AC. He said it didn't matter to him at all if the machines he was using were the ones he built or the ones in his head.

And for some reason I thought of this tonight, and it made me happy, so I thought I'd share.

Comments

[firni.livejournal.com]

My husband thinks Tesla is a god (small "g").

[cosmolinguist]

Yeah, I could see that.

[kratkrat.livejournal.com]

You might like to read Tesla: Man Out of Time, or some other biography of Tesla. He was incomparably brilliant. I have no idea what the number was based upon, but a science-buff friend (whose opinion I trust) told me that it is estimated that 90 percent of the stuff Tesla figured out died with him... which I think is tragic.

Tesla did things and had experiments he displayed to others, and as of the writing of the book I mentioned, scientists STILL could not figure out how he did some of it.

You know those questionnaire chain letters you get sometime over email, that ask your feelings/opinions and the like? One popular one includes "Whom would you most like to meet, living or dead?" My answer to that has always been "If we could get over the language barrier, Archimedes." But a very close second to him is Tesla.

[cosmolinguist]

Yeah, there are advantages to writing stuff down ... :-)

Still, it's kind of cool (if more inefficient) to know that there are things we don't know, beause some brilliant person has figured them out and the rest of us haven't managed to catch up to him or her yet.

I think Archimedes and Tesla are both really good choices for a question like that. :-)

P.S.

[cosmolinguist]

I forgot this the last time:

Dude, it isn't Christmas anymore. Are you going to update your icon? You could be Cupid! :-D

That is all.

Tesla

[tassostantsis.livejournal.com]

I had a period of liking Tesla myself but it was long ago during prehistoric times when a band called Orchestral Maneuvers in the Dark that appealed to my pre-self had a minor hit titled "Tesla Girls". Contemporary to that was the science lesson at school informing me of who he was and this strange combination made me like him.
Of course that period is over but with the eighties being a la mode

again and you mentioning him there is a good chance I will be liking him again.

Re: Tesla

[cosmolinguist]

I understand; I'm suggestible like that, too. Hearing about a band whose CDs have been collecting dust around here can inspire me to dig them out and listen to them again. My brain isn't erally big enough for me to rememeber all the things I like, at one time. And I don't know all that much about Tesla, really, but if it's enough to interest me it's unsurprising that it'd be enough to rekindle someone else's old interest. :-)

[ivana-duboise.livejournal.com]

Tesla and Goethe both kick ass. However, I don't think that Goethe ever conceive building a death ray.

[cosmolinguist]

Well, not everybody gets to kick ass in the same way. That would be boring. We don't need everybody thinking about death rays; some people should still write poetry and think philosophical things.

But yeah, you're right; they both rock.

I wonder what would happen to me if I memorized some Goethe and went around saying it to myself...

DEATH TO ALL

[evil-grapefruit.livejournal.com]

I want a death ray!