If Tesla were alive today would the world be different?

[Gingerbread Demon]

Well the tech world anyway?

If Tesla say was born in the middle of the 20th Century and created all the ideas he had in mind would the world of technology be different?

 

[YellowSubmarine]

Tesla isn't alive today? False premise. There are plenty of people who, while still vastly different people, possess qualities of comparable relevance. So even if Earth's magnetic field is only 45 microteslas, there are thousands of Teslas running around it. All alive today. All up to different things. Some might be running bakeries.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Tesla isn't alive today? False premise. There are plenty of people who, while still vastly different people, possess qualities of comparable relevance. So even if Earth's magnetic field is only 45 microteslas, there are thousands of Teslas running around it. All alive today. All up to different things. Some might be running bakeries.

I meant Nikola Tesla the crazy inventor

 

[Nerys Myk]

Would a Nikola Tesla born in the mid 20th Century really be the same man?

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

Would a Nikola Tesla born in the mid 20th Century really be the same man?

Maybe not, maybe more.

I'm just wondering where his ideas would have gone had he been born in a different time period. Would he have still been the same kind of inventor as he was in history, or would he have gone down another path?

 

[YellowSubmarine]

I meant Nikola Tesla the crazy inventor

The crazy inventor? Never heard of him. I was talking about the electrical engineer who invented Tesla coils.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

The crazy inventor? Never heard of him. I was talking about the electrical engineer who invented Tesla coils.

That's the same guy haha...... OK I've read different opinions about him, that some of his ideas were crazy and impractical.... Nikola Tesla Who had a long running rivalry with Thomas Edison...

I just wonder had he been born in say 1920 and lived into the 20th Century

 

[USS Triumphant]

If he was alive today, he'd be saying "Help! Get me outta this box!"

More seriously, if he had been born in the 1920s, we might be a tiny bit further along technologically - or, we might all be dead, as some batshit crazy weapon he developed for WWII or the Cold War ended up being used and really DID set the whole atmosphere on fire or cause the magnetosphere to die or something.

 

[publiusr]

In terms of a crazy weapon-- I wonder about what was used in Cuba on ambassadors there.

I seem to remember an old blurb from the 90's--something called an "Elipton"
https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-874076.html

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

In terms of a crazy weapon-- I wonder about what was used in Cuba on ambassadors there.

I seem to remember an old blurb from the 90's--something called an "Elipton"
https://www.highbeam.com/doc/1P2-874076.html

That sounds like something Barry Smith told us about many years ago. He's a Ken Ham disciple. Anyway he mentioned Israel had some kind of sound weapon that could strip the flesh of enemies in a single blast but they are too afraid to use it.

I call bullshit

 

[Warp Core Breach]

 

[Haggis and tatties]

He would be in jail for continuing to feed the pigeons. Lol

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

He proposed giving electrical power away for free with no way of metering who was using it. Not a commercial proposition, which is likely why it was stiffled by the rich and powerful.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

He proposed giving electrical power away for free with no way of metering who was using it. Not a commercial proposition, which is likely why it was stiffled by the rich and powerful.

Yes that was through his invention of wireless electricity... But the scale was inpractical.... Would it work today, I just don't know.

 

[publiusr]

There are limits to what Wardenclyffe could do. Besides, that dirty power would play havoc on consumer devices and communications.

I'm a big DC fan. That may be making a come-back--but AC still beats everything in terms of range...for now.

 

[Gingerbread Demon]

There are limits to what Wardenclyffe could do. Besides, that dirty power would play havoc on consumer devices and communications.

You mean EM radiation don't you?

Yeah that could be a problem with such a system.


I read a few blogs over the years that Edison wasn't the great hero everyone claims.

 

[Nebusj]

Yes that was through his invention of wireless electricity... But the scale was inpractical.... Would it work today, I just don't know.

I've got a pretty strong hunch.

 

[Robert Maxwell]

I read a few blogs over the years that Edison wasn't the great hero everyone claims.

One could reasonably say he was the Steve Jobs of his day: brilliant in some ways, good at taking credit for the hard work of a large number of people, and a relentless asshole.

 

[ChasFink]

He proposed giving electrical power away for free with no way of metering who was using it. Not a commercial proposition, which is likely why it was stiffled by the rich and powerful.

I thought the idea was that the power would be free, but the AC frequencies would be modulated to carry long-distance messages, and the message service would pay for the power. Not that that would necessarily work, but it is a commercial plan.

BTW, if Tesla was born later and was alive today, technology would be worse - because AC power and radio wouldn't have been invented until much later.

 

[Asbo Zaprudder]

I thought the idea was that the power would be free, but the AC frequencies would be modulated to carry long-distance messages, and the message service would pay for the power. Not that that would necessarily work, but it is a commercial plan.

BTW, if Tesla was born later and was alive today, technology would be worse - because AC power and radio wouldn't have been invented until much later.

Hmm, I think the AC power distribution infrastructure we ended up with is a lot less frightening than what Tesla proposed. He might have beaten Marconi in demonstrating radio communication (for remote control rather than messaging) but he just didn't seem to have the capitalist gene to promote and exploit the technology.