Why Nikola Tesla was the greatest geek who ever lived
theoatmeal,com
Geeks stay up all night disassembling the world so that they can put it back together with new features.
They tinker and fix things that aren´t broken.
Geeks abandon the world around them because they´re busy soldering together a new one.
They obsess and, in many cases, they suffer.
Over one hundred years ago, a Serbian-American inventor by the name of
NIKOLA TESLA started fixing things that weren´t broken.
NIKOLA TESLA started fixing things that weren´t broken.
In a time when the majority of the world was still lit by candle power, an electrical system known as alternating current was invented and to this day is what powers every home on the planet.
Who do we have to thank for the invention that ushered humanity into a second industrial revolution? Nikola Tesla.
“But I thought Thomas Edison was the father of the electrical age” –everyone
Nope. It was Tesla.
When most people think of Thomas Edison, they think of the man who invented the light bulb.
Edison did not invent the light bulb, he improved upon ideas of 22 other men who pioneered the light bulb before him.
Edison simply figured out how to sell the light bulb.
Tesla actually worked for Edison early in his career.
Edison
offered to pay him the modern equivalent of a million dollars to fix
the problems he was having with his Dc generators and motors.
Tesla fixed Edison´s machines and when he asked for the money he was promised, Edison laughed him off and had this to say.
“Tesla, you don´t understand our American humor.”
Edison is a good example of a non-geek who operated in a geek space.
He
believed the value of his inventions could be gauged by how much money
they made. He was neither a mathematician nor a scientist – he believed
he could just hire people to do that for him.
Edison was not a geek; he was a CEO.
Tesla
was known for discovering amazing things and then forgetting to write
them down. Edison was known for rushing to the patent office as soon as
one of his employees has something.
After his falling out with Edison, Tesla went to world on his alternating current electrical system.
This ignited a feud with Edison, who at the time was trying to sell the world his direct current system.
Edison´s DC system required a power plant every square mile and couldn´t transmit electricity very far. AC used thinner wires, had higher voltages, and could transmit electricity over long distances.
So what did Edison do?
Families living in the neighborhood near Edison´s laboratory began notice that their pets were disappearing.
This was because Edison had been paying schoolboys twenty-five cents a head for live dogs and cats.
He then put these dogs and cats on display and publicly electrocuted them using Tesla´s alternating current.
His goal was to publicly smear Tesla´s AC and convince the public that it was too dangerous for home use.
In short, the only thing Edison truly pioneered was douchebaggery.
He won a Nobel Prize in Physics for inventing Radio.
Did
you know that everything he did was based on work previously done by
Tesla? After Marconi became world-famous for sending the first
transatlantic message, this was Tesla´s response.
“Marconi is a good fellow. Let him continue. He is using seventeen of my patents”
Basically, Tesla = Nicest, Inventor. EVER.
Ever heard of RADAR?
AKA.
That awesome technology that lets us detect objects like cruise
missiles and latte-sipping-SUV-driving imbeciles who do 85 in a 45.
An English scientist by the name of Robert a. Watson-Watt was credited with the invention of radar in 1935.
Can you guess who came up with the idea in 1917?
18 years before Watson-Watt
Nikola Tesla.
He
pitched it to the U.S. Navy at the beginning of World War I when the
world was getting its butthole forcibly imploded by German U-boats.
Unfortunately,
Thomas
Edison was the head of R&D for the U.S. Navy at the time and he
managed to convince them that it had no practical application in war.
Nice Job, Edison, you bloated, misguided ass. I hope a Nazi Torpedo hit your grandchildren right in the mouth.
Wilhelm Rontgen is typically credited as the discoverer of X-rays.
Can you guess the mustache-donning inventor who bet him to it and got basically zero credit?
Nikola Goddamn Tesla.
Also,
when X-rays were initially discovered it was believed that they could
cure blindness and other ailments. Tesla warned that X-rays could be dangerous and he refused to conduct medical experiments with them,
Edison,
not skipping a beat when the opportunity to be awful presented itself,
got to work right away on human trials in X-ray experimentation. One of
his employees, Clarence Dally, was exposed to so much radiation that his
arms had to be amputated to save his life. It didn´t work though, and he eventually died from mediastinal cancer.
Dally
is considered to be the first American to die from experimentation with
radiation – Finally Edison invents something original!
In addition to killing his assistant,
Edison nearly blinded himself by repeatedly firing X-rays at his own
eyes. When asked about X-rays later on, this was Edison´s reply:
“Don´t talk to me about X-rays, I am afraid of them – Thomas Edison, 1903”
Fucking idiot.
Ever wonder who built the first hydroelectric plant at Niagara Falls and proved to the world that this type of power was a practical energy source?
Nikola Tesla.
Who was experimenting with cryogenic engineering nearly a half century before its invention?
Tesla.
Who held patents over a hundred years ago that were later used in development of the transistor?
The
transistor is the device which makes the information age possible so
you can refresh your Facebook page and download donkey porn and whatnot.
Tesla.
Who was the first person to record radio waves from outer space?
(inadvertently making himself the father of radio astronomy)
Tesla.
Who discovered the resonant frequency of the earth?
Tesla.
Who built an earthquake machine that nearly demolished an entire neighborhood in New York City when it was turn on?
Tesla.
Ever heard of ball lightning?
It´s lightning that appears in the form of a sphere and travels slowly while hovering a few feet above the ground.
It´s an extreme rare phenomenon and even today no scientists have ever successfully produced it in a laboratory.
This is not ball lightning
Oh, except Tesla did it back in the 1890s.
Ever wonder who invented remote control?
Tesla.
Neon Lighting?
Tesla.
He modern electric motor?
Tesla.
Wireless communications?
Tesla.
Oh
right, that was something Tesla invented but didn´t share with the world
probably because he was afraid of uninspired jackasses stealing his
patents.
Without question, Tesla was a genius.
He spoke eight languages:
Serbian, English, Czech, German, French, Hungarian, Italian, and Latin.
Most of us only speak one language (and poorly at that)
He could memorize entire books and recite them at will.
Most of us can´t even remember our passwords.
He could visualize devices entirely in his head and then build them without ever writing anything down.
Most of us only spend time visualizing things like naked women and greasy sandwiches.
And even more impressive, the man lived to be 86 and was celibate his entire life.
Tesla:
a handsome dude who turned down sex for 86 years because he was too
busy creating artificial lightning storms in his apartment.
P.S. Thomas Edison married a sixteen year old girl.
P.P.S. that´s the last time I´ll bitch about Edison, I swear.
So with this incredible mind and all these inventions behind him, Tesla should have been rich and famous, right?
Unfortunately, no.
Tesla
lived in a time when the world demanded results that were practical and
profitable. We didn´t want radio astronomy we want light bulbs and
toaster ovens.
Tesla´s contributions were not incremental; they were revolutionary.
One
of Tesla´s final gifts to the world was a tower near New York City that
would have provided free wireless energy to the entire planet. The man
who financed the construction of the tower shut it down when he learned
that there would be no way to regulate the energy and therefore it
wouldn´t make money.
This
acquisitiveness and greed plagued most of Tesla´s career, ad he spent
the majority of it being broke. In addition, Tesla also suffered from a
disorder we now commonly refer to as “being batshit insane.”
Tesla
hallucinated and often had a hard time differentiating between reality
and his imagination, which is why he spent years alone in his laboratory
working day and night.
He often said that the only time he was truly happy was when he was cooped up in his lab.
Tesla died
broke and alone in a NYC hotel room. He´d been living on milk and
Nabisco crackers, and in one of his final interviews he revealed
something of a very personal nature:
“I
have been feeling pigeons, thousands of them, for years. But there was
one pigeon, a beautiful bird, pure white with light gray tips on its
wings; that one was different. It was a female. I would know that pigeon
anywhere. No matter where I was that pigeon would find me, when I
wanted her I had only to wish and call her she would come flying to me.
She understood me and U understood her. I loved that pigeon. Yes, I
loved her as a man loves a woman, and she loved me. As a looked at her I
knew she wanted to tell me – she was dying. And then, as I got her
message, there came a light from her eyes – powerful beams of light.”
Living on crackers and talking yo an imaginary laser pigeon?!
That was Tesla´s reward for all the things he gave to humanity?!
I´m sorry.
I´m so very very sorry.
You were a man displaced in time; an Archimedes, of the 19th century.
You were the greatest geek who ever lived in a time when the human race was crappier than usual.
And
there are not enough nouns in the English language to append to the
world “douche” when describing Thomas Edison, but I will try anyway:
Douchebucket,
Docuchebagel, DoucheBuffalo, DoucheMouth, DoucheSplosion,
SoucheThunder, DoucheFace, Douchey Mc. DoucherDouche, Quarter pounder
with douche, DoucheCapter, DoucheBallon, DouchePickle, Mixed greens with
a douche Viangrette, RaisinBallsDoucheSkull
July 10th is Nikola Tesla day, and I will be editing Wikipedia in your honor.
On behalf of those who obsess, tinker, and fix things aren´t broken consider it my way of saying
Thank you, Nikola Tesla.
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