[HN Gopher] My Inventions - Nikola Tesla (1919)
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My Inventions - Nikola Tesla (1919)
Author : cbracketdash
Score : 52 points
Date : 2023-05-18 19:02 UTC (3 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (archive.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (archive.org)
| miles wrote:
| Here are the original _Electrical Experimenter_ sources, which
| are in the public domain:
|
| * February 1919 (The _My Inventions_ series begins with Part 1,
| _My Early Life_ , on page 696):
| https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Electrical-Experimente...
|
| * March 1919 (Part 2, _My First Efforts in Invention_ , begins on
| page 776): https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Electrical-
| Experimente...
|
| * April 1919 (Part 3, _My Later Endeavors_ , begins on page 864):
| https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Electrical-Experimente...
|
| * May 1919 (Part 4, _The Discovery of the Tesla Coil and
| Transformer_ , begins on page 16):
| https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Electrical-Experimente...
|
| * June 1919 (Part 5, _The Magnifying Transmitter_ , begins on
| page 112): https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Electrical-
| Experimente...
|
| * October 1919 (Part 6, _The Art of Telautomatics_ , begins on
| page 506): https://worldradiohistory.com/Archive-Electrical-
| Experimente...
| nahuel0x wrote:
| These magazines are a thing of beauty!
| tomcam wrote:
| Those scans are excellent, thank you. Someone took a lot of
| care with these.
| cbracketdash wrote:
| These look great, thanks a lot for sharing!
| Ecoste wrote:
| Tesla was _weird_. I guess you have to be extraordinary to do
| extraordinary things. Einstein was also big on imagination, but I
| guess with none of the _weird_ stuff. Another two interesting
| figures are Jack Parsons and Konstantin Tsiolkovsky. Jack was
| heavily involved in the occult and followed Thelema which was
| founded by Aleister Crowley which included lots of sex magick and
| the like. Konstantin Tsiolkovsky is one of the founding fathers
| of modern rocketry and astronautics, and he claimed to be
| speaking to extraterrestrial beings from time to time who would
| give him information.
| moomoo11 wrote:
| Honestly that just seems in line with people who are into
| psychedelics (not casual microdosers lol) and hardcore
| engineering.
|
| Know a few pkeple like that. They are genius tier but quirky
| af.
| mrwnmonm wrote:
| "They are good but I am better than them."
| yellowstuff wrote:
| Tesla was a lot weirder than Einstein, but Einstein's personal
| life was not totally normal. He wrote his wife a letter saying
| "You will expect no affection from me", cheated on her with his
| first cousin, then married his first cousin, but only after
| deciding against marrying her daughter instead.
|
| https://allthatsinteresting.com/elsa-einstein
| cbracketdash wrote:
| Yeah it seems like Tesla had a relatively respectable view on
| relationships:
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikola_Tesla#Relationships
| input_sh wrote:
| I'd point out that nearly everyone around that time at least
| occasionally dabbled in some substance abuse.
| cbracketdash wrote:
| Some sentences I've highlighted:
|
| "I am credited with being one of the hardest workers and perhaps
| I am, if _thought_ is the equivalent of labor, for I have devoted
| to it almost all of my waking hours. "
|
| "Our first endeavors are purely instinctive, promptings of an
| imagination vivid and undisciplined...but those early impulses,
| tho not immediately productive, are of the greatest moment and
| may shape our very destinies."
|
| "When I get an idea I start at once building it up in my
| imagination".
|
| "But instinct is something which transcends knowledge. We have,
| undoubtedly, certain finer fibers that enable us to perceive
| truths when logical deduction, or any other willful effort of the
| brain, is futile."
| cbracketdash wrote:
| A particular point Tesla repeats throughout the short essay is
| how he would spend lots of time visually imagining his inventions
| to each particular part. This small point is worth considering
| and I quite frankly enjoy doing too (I stayed up for hours last
| night visualizing and "editing" structures in my brain !)
| proee wrote:
| What kind of inventions have you come up with? What ideas are
| you modeling in your brain?
| cbracketdash wrote:
| Well I can't delve into too much detail yet but it includes a
| bunch of moving gears that aren't trivial to keep in place.
| So I'm trying to figure out some casings for the motor.
|
| When I first read Tesla's writing last night, I began by just
| simply allowing my imagination to do a test run of building
| something. I first began by imagining a cylinder. I rotated
| the cylinder and observed the sharp edges. I didn't like that
| so I smoothed it out. Then I imagined a hollowed out cylinder
| with its edges smoothed out. How about adding a horizontal
| beam through it. Or maybe two? And what if they intersect.
| All of this I would imagine in my head.
|
| Overall, it felt like a more versatile approach then spending
| hours tinkering with Freecad. I spent a bit more time coming
| up with models for my specific project before realizing it
| was 1:30 AM. WARNING: THIS METHOD WILL KEEP YOU AWAKE AT
| NIGHT FOR HOURS.
|
| :)
| proee wrote:
| Thanks for sharing, I also enjoy staring at a blank wall
| and letting my mind think about various inventions and
| projects. Usually they are kinetic art ideas with novel
| movements. I probably have 20 good ideas that I keep
| iterating on. The other night I had a dream about a kinetic
| art piece and was able to wake up with full details on how
| it could work - this was a first for me. Now I just need to
| build them!
| throwaway14356 wrote:
| all kinds! Thinking of a good example: An ally with a vending
| machine at the end and a conveyor belt as the floor of the
| alley. If you try to smash or damage the machine the conveyor
| belt will prevent you from walking away.
| Ecoste wrote:
| Maybe we could go for a telephone booth style machine that
| would lock the door (and the vandal) inside, and then
| https://youtu.be/EbmQxZkSswI?t=57
| cbracketdash wrote:
| nahhh man just kick the door down ;)
| cbracketdash wrote:
| What specific purpose would this serve? Also what would
| prevent someone from just sprinting off the belt?
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(page generated 2023-05-18 23:00 UTC)