New Edisons? Was: [OT] Simple math considered physics

[Jim Kuzdrall]

On Friday 23 November 2007 21:47, Ric Werme wrote:
>
> As for the former, I wrote the following a while back.  While it ran
> in the NH Mensa newsletter, I was never happy with it and haven't
> put it on the web yet.  Too many omissions, too many sentences that
> need their own paragraph, but it really needs to be short and great,
> not short and good enough or too long to be memorable.  I'll fix it
> someday.

   I believe it was Jean Jacques Rousseau who concluded a letter to a 
friend saying, "I am sorry this letter is so long, but I did not have 
time to write a shorter one."  (Did I get that attribution right?)
>
>     No More Edisons?
>        -by Ric Werme
> ...
> Some of the best inventions are things that are fairly simple but no
> one ever considered them before.

    They are definitely impressive when they occur.  But most advances 
require more sophistication now days.  The nanowire technology required 
elaborate facilities to observe it and even more to confirm and perfect 
it.  Although the knowledge to deduce the trapdoor algorithm behind PGP 
could possibly be accomplished by years of self-study in mathematics, 
it is likely that some mentoring would be required along the way - even 
for a genius. 
>
> Can there be another Edison?  Perhaps, but he'll have a different
> background. Few people are as widely read, as experienced, and as
> insightful as Thomas Edison was.

    The thrust of your essay seems very reasonable.  Addressing just the 
environmental part, there are many people born each year with 
intellects on par with that of Edison, but it is the experiences 
shaping those intellects that seems to make the difference.

    If that is the case, the new Edisons are likely growing up right now 
in India, China, and Indonesia.  The factors you mention that are now 
missing in the US all seem to be present there.  There are families 
that are poor in material goods but rich in wise principles that 
nurture learning, self-sufficiency, and ingenuity.  Children are given 
little and expected to endure hardship - even mistreatment - increasing 
their incentive to better themselves.  There are few regulations to 
prevent "dangerous" experimentation.  The economies are growing rapidly 
and are open to new ideas.

> However, 
> they have never achieved more than a small bit of Edison's fame and
> impact.  The biggest obstacle may not be personal, but environmental.

    When Edison flourished there were about 1 billion people world wide.  
Now there are 6 billion competing for the spot light.  It seems that 
access to education and economic opportunity may have spread to a 
larger percentage, making it even harder to get world-wide attention.

    Inventions on par with Edison's are lost among an explosion of many.  
Air conditioning, antibiotics, ultrasonic medical imaging, chemical 
fertilizers, TV ...  (To counter, it is still not impossible.  See 
Ben's note on Linus.)

>  Until a new "disruptive technology" like nanotechnology opens up
> thousands of avenues for invention, there may not be room enough for
> a new Thomas Edison.

    I like to differentiate between evolutionary technologies and truly 
disruptive inventions.  Special horse breeds and Concord coaches are 
evolutionary or extrapolations.  The ingenious combination of several 
new technologies to produce the automobile was "disruptive".  But it is 
sometimes hard to draw a clean line.  Certainly, travel beyond the 
speed of light would be disruptive.

    I am presently reading the autobiography of Benjamin Franklin.  It 
parallels your synopsis of Edison.

Jim Kuzdrall