Sunday, October 22, 2006
Wednesday, October 18, 2006
Latest Biography - Nicola Tesla
I am on Biograpy spree these days and that too of the Scientific Heroes. In the past 12 months, I have read John Nash's biography - "A Beautiful Mind", Stephen Hawking's - "A Life in Science" and now the latest one on Nicola Tesla - "The man who invented the 20th Century".
This was the first time I picked a biography of someone I did not know anything about. I only recalled hearing the word 'Tesla' in my school days Physics as a measuring unit for Magnetic field. Interestingly, this is the first biography I have read of a genius that discusses how NOT to do business. In fact, author uses this book to teach his MBA students on 'How not to run your business affairs'.
Imagine someone coming up with an idea of supersonic travel to any location in the world at an affordable cost and asking Boeing or AirBus to fund his research. Why will Boeing fund a research which may put its own business model at a complete risk? Thats precisely what Tesla did and combined with his own commercial mistakes, he lost all the opportunities to take the credit of "Supersonic Journey at an affordable cost".
People who have read the battle of currents being fought in the last 2 decades of 19th century will realize that AC Power is parallel to "Supersonic Journey at an affordable cost" in today's world. Though, they treat this as a battle between Edison and Westinghouse as the name Tesla does not figure at all in all the business books now. However, it was Tesla who first conceived the idea of providing AC power supply to each and every Household and asked Edison to fund his reasearch. Edison was a kind of Bill Gates of that time running his business Empire on DC power which was very very inefficient. A DC Power-house could only supply the electric power in the 1 mile vicinity unlike AC power-house which had the potential of supplying to thousands of miles. And this idea can only be conceived by the genius of Tesla.
Edison obviously did not fund his research and interestingly utilized all sources of media to mouth bad publicity for AC power. People who call Edison as the father of Electricity should note this. Westinghouse came to the rescue of Tesla but he obviously had his own vested commercial interest. Sensing Tesla's lack of business Acumen, he bought all the Tesla's Patents at a throaway price with an assurance that he will fund all his research. To Tesla the scientific genius, thats all what mattered then! He then came up with so many ideas (radio, Torpedo, Wireless electric Supply etc) but never published them formally.
When he died in 1934, he had so many ideas written in his notes that US Govt termed these documents as "TOP SECRET". It is believed that most of his ideas were 50 to 100 years in advance. Marconi is credited with the invention of Radio, something which Tesla had designed and showed to his friends 20 years before Marconi. We have still not seen practically the wireless supply of AC power, something which Tesla demonstrated in a small town of Colorado to the Town officials in the ealry 20th century.
In the end, you sympathize with the guy albeit aware that he is the only one to blame for his failure to some extent. I was in awe after reading his through ideas as it is more than evident that Tesla was the Raw Natural Genius in a true sense of the words.
This was the first time I picked a biography of someone I did not know anything about. I only recalled hearing the word 'Tesla' in my school days Physics as a measuring unit for Magnetic field. Interestingly, this is the first biography I have read of a genius that discusses how NOT to do business. In fact, author uses this book to teach his MBA students on 'How not to run your business affairs'.
Imagine someone coming up with an idea of supersonic travel to any location in the world at an affordable cost and asking Boeing or AirBus to fund his research. Why will Boeing fund a research which may put its own business model at a complete risk? Thats precisely what Tesla did and combined with his own commercial mistakes, he lost all the opportunities to take the credit of "Supersonic Journey at an affordable cost".
People who have read the battle of currents being fought in the last 2 decades of 19th century will realize that AC Power is parallel to "Supersonic Journey at an affordable cost" in today's world. Though, they treat this as a battle between Edison and Westinghouse as the name Tesla does not figure at all in all the business books now. However, it was Tesla who first conceived the idea of providing AC power supply to each and every Household and asked Edison to fund his reasearch. Edison was a kind of Bill Gates of that time running his business Empire on DC power which was very very inefficient. A DC Power-house could only supply the electric power in the 1 mile vicinity unlike AC power-house which had the potential of supplying to thousands of miles. And this idea can only be conceived by the genius of Tesla.
Edison obviously did not fund his research and interestingly utilized all sources of media to mouth bad publicity for AC power. People who call Edison as the father of Electricity should note this. Westinghouse came to the rescue of Tesla but he obviously had his own vested commercial interest. Sensing Tesla's lack of business Acumen, he bought all the Tesla's Patents at a throaway price with an assurance that he will fund all his research. To Tesla the scientific genius, thats all what mattered then! He then came up with so many ideas (radio, Torpedo, Wireless electric Supply etc) but never published them formally.
When he died in 1934, he had so many ideas written in his notes that US Govt termed these documents as "TOP SECRET". It is believed that most of his ideas were 50 to 100 years in advance. Marconi is credited with the invention of Radio, something which Tesla had designed and showed to his friends 20 years before Marconi. We have still not seen practically the wireless supply of AC power, something which Tesla demonstrated in a small town of Colorado to the Town officials in the ealry 20th century.
In the end, you sympathize with the guy albeit aware that he is the only one to blame for his failure to some extent. I was in awe after reading his through ideas as it is more than evident that Tesla was the Raw Natural Genius in a true sense of the words.
Monday, October 09, 2006
Back to the future
Last weekend I resorted to my good old passtime: dreaming (Read Contemplating) about the future. It has been quite a while that I dreamt of my future as the "Poor Piscean" in myself was getting used to the ground realities of life.
Having a child in one's life is really an amazing experience. You start thinking about your early years and inadvertently try to draw a parallel/ contrasts between your early years and those of your child's. It is a good experience juxtaposing your past with your child's present and the future. Every parent wants to do the "best" for their child. The only problem is that very few of them are sure what is "best".
Like any other ordinary parent, I am also struggling to define the "best" these days. There are actually so many variables that shape a child's personality in the future years. I have now realized that rather than analyzing those variables (which are not in your control anyways), it is better to just focus on imbibing the "right set" of values in your child. And as you would have guessed it by now, everyone has their own definition of the "right set".
The challenge of parenting is that you experiment as your child is growing up. But by the time, the "result" of those experiments appear, it is too late and too distant to conclude the potential factors behind those results.
So the conclusion - Do what you feel is the best for your child. There is nothing absolute right or wrong anyways in this world.
Having a child in one's life is really an amazing experience. You start thinking about your early years and inadvertently try to draw a parallel/ contrasts between your early years and those of your child's. It is a good experience juxtaposing your past with your child's present and the future. Every parent wants to do the "best" for their child. The only problem is that very few of them are sure what is "best".
Like any other ordinary parent, I am also struggling to define the "best" these days. There are actually so many variables that shape a child's personality in the future years. I have now realized that rather than analyzing those variables (which are not in your control anyways), it is better to just focus on imbibing the "right set" of values in your child. And as you would have guessed it by now, everyone has their own definition of the "right set".
The challenge of parenting is that you experiment as your child is growing up. But by the time, the "result" of those experiments appear, it is too late and too distant to conclude the potential factors behind those results.
So the conclusion - Do what you feel is the best for your child. There is nothing absolute right or wrong anyways in this world.
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