3 ms·

What sort of scientific Scrooge chooses to take his invention to the grave like that? What has he gained in the end?

by Camillo 13y ago

nodata 13y ago
I'm sure he didn't plan to die.
- vacri 13y ago
  Not having something robust sorted out for your invention to survive your death by the time you're 78 years of age? That's bad planning. Or, perhaps, being a scrooge.
  - harrytuttle 13y ago
    In this particular case, it's probably the fear of not profiting from your invention. Older patent holders I've seen tend to be paranoid or obsessed with the money rather than what they have created.
ronilan 13y ago
> What has he gained in the end? Nothing. Most dead people, not matter what they "achieved" in life, gain nothing in the end. They are just dead. The idea that your goal in life is to leave a "legacy" is not universal. Life happens as it happens. Apparently for this "scientific Scrooge" it didn't happen in a way that enabled him to share his invention, so when the time came, he just took his invention to the grave. Same thing most likely happened numerous times in history with inventions, works of art and other "legacy items" we never heard about...
alan_cx 13y ago
Ages ago I spent a fair amount of time considering what would happen if someone invented a new power source. I was planning to try to write a short story based on the idea. In my imagination I invented a device the size of a fridge freezer capable of powering a small town for 100 years. The workings and science were irrelevant, but the politics of it was what interested me. I cant find the notes I made now, but essentially I ended up deciding that something so revolutionary, if proved and accepted as doing what it said on the tin, would take a life of its own. I came to the conclusion that once people know of its existence, the inventor will lose all control and become an instant target. Such inventions are the "babies" of such inventors, so loss of control is an issue. Becoming a target, more so. I'm not sure what the people who did the science that lead to nuclear stuff intended or thought, but if it were me, the idea that my science was used to make such evil devices as nuclear bombs would at the very least cause me trouble. Interestingly there is some relevance to what is happening now with the NSA internet spying issue. People may well look at this sort of behavior and conclude that there are no limits for certain nation states. So, if a Belgian, for a random small country example, were to invent such technology, and say this person decided that only small poor countries could have access to it in order to equalize small poor countries with rich ones, how might the likes of China, UK, USA, India, etc, react to that? What would be their limit to acquire such technology? The second you deploy such a unit, spies would be all over it. Perhaps, war. So in the end, unless you do as told, your good might end up slaughtering millions. Now, I'm not saying that starlite was or is for real, or that the inventor thought this way, but I can certainly see why such an inventor might be so paranoid as to get in to a position where the secret dies with him. Of course I am very open to the idea that this says more about my personal psychology that any general point...
- fleitz 13y ago
  Once one has lost control what is the value in being a 'target'? You can't really be both. The steam engine, refrigeration, etc, are all examples of this kind of invention which make their inventors quite well off even if eventually eclipsed by successors. War is inevitable... don't fret over some invention, if it's useful in war it will be used in war regardless of its other merits. Often the tech transfer is backwards, from war to civilian life.
- jacquesm 13y ago
  That's more or less the premise of Atlas Shrugged. John Galt (one of the protagonists) invents a device just like that.
  - jackgavigan 13y ago
    In the sci-fi novel 'Friday', Robert Heinlein writes about a physicist named Daniel Shipstone who realised that 'the problem was not a shortage of energy but lay in the transporting of energy. Energy is everywhere—in sunlight, in wind, in mountain streams, in temperature gradients of all sorts wherever found, in coal, in fossil oil, in radioactive ores, in green growing things. Especially in ocean depths and in outer space energy is free for the taking in amounts lavish beyond all human comprehension.' In the story, Shipstone quits his job, retreats to his basement and invents a technology that packs 'more kilowatt-hours into a smaller space and a smaller mass than any other engineer had ever dreamed of. To call it an "improved storage battery" (as some early accounts did) is like calling an H-bomb an "improved firecracker."' Like Ward and Musk [1], Shipstone eschews patenting his new technology in order to deny others the opportunity to steal it (or tie him up in court cases) and instead begins manufacturing the devices (eponymously named "Shipstones") which end up becoming ubiquitous, powering everything from flashlights and automobiles, to households and ocean-going ships. The company he founds becomes the largest and most powerful industrial conglomerate in the galaxy and the method of manufacturing Shipstones remains a closely-held secret. [1: http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-patents-2012-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-patents-2012-11 ]
    - 13y ago

What sort of scientific Scrooge chooses to take his invention to the grave like that? What has he gained in the end?

by Camillo 13y ago

What sort of scientific Scrooge chooses to take his invention to the grave like that? What has he gained in the end?

nodata 13y ago

I'm sure he didn't plan to die.

vacri 13y ago
Not having something robust sorted out for your invention to survive your death by the time you're 78 years of age? That's bad planning. Or, perhaps, being a scrooge.
- harrytuttle 13y ago
  In this particular case, it's probably the fear of not profiting from your invention. Older patent holders I've seen tend to be paranoid or obsessed with the money rather than what they have created.

ronilan 13y ago

> What has he gained in the end? Nothing. Most dead people, not matter what they "achieved" in life, gain nothing in the end. They are just dead. The idea that your goal in life is to leave a "legacy" is not universal. Life happens as it happens. Apparently for this "scientific Scrooge" it didn't happen in a way that enabled him to share his invention, so when the time came, he just took his invention to the grave. Same thing most likely happened numerous times in history with inventions, works of art and other "legacy items" we never heard about...

alan_cx 13y ago

Ages ago I spent a fair amount of time considering what would happen if someone invented a new power source. I was planning to try to write a short story based on the idea. In my imagination I invented a device the size of a fridge freezer capable of powering a small town for 100 years. The workings and science were irrelevant, but the politics of it was what interested me. I cant find the notes I made now, but essentially I ended up deciding that something so revolutionary, if proved and accepted as doing what it said on the tin, would take a life of its own. I came to the conclusion that once people know of its existence, the inventor will lose all control and become an instant target. Such inventions are the "babies" of such inventors, so loss of control is an issue. Becoming a target, more so. I'm not sure what the people who did the science that lead to nuclear stuff intended or thought, but if it were me, the idea that my science was used to make such evil devices as nuclear bombs would at the very least cause me trouble. Interestingly there is some relevance to what is happening now with the NSA internet spying issue. People may well look at this sort of behavior and conclude that there are no limits for certain nation states. So, if a Belgian, for a random small country example, were to invent such technology, and say this person decided that only small poor countries could have access to it in order to equalize small poor countries with rich ones, how might the likes of China, UK, USA, India, etc, react to that? What would be their limit to acquire such technology? The second you deploy such a unit, spies would be all over it. Perhaps, war. So in the end, unless you do as told, your good might end up slaughtering millions. Now, I'm not saying that starlite was or is for real, or that the inventor thought this way, but I can certainly see why such an inventor might be so paranoid as to get in to a position where the secret dies with him. Of course I am very open to the idea that this says more about my personal psychology that any general point...

fleitz 13y ago
Once one has lost control what is the value in being a 'target'? You can't really be both. The steam engine, refrigeration, etc, are all examples of this kind of invention which make their inventors quite well off even if eventually eclipsed by successors. War is inevitable... don't fret over some invention, if it's useful in war it will be used in war regardless of its other merits. Often the tech transfer is backwards, from war to civilian life.
jacquesm 13y ago
That's more or less the premise of Atlas Shrugged. John Galt (one of the protagonists) invents a device just like that.
- jackgavigan 13y ago
  In the sci-fi novel 'Friday', Robert Heinlein writes about a physicist named Daniel Shipstone who realised that 'the problem was not a shortage of energy but lay in the transporting of energy. Energy is everywhere—in sunlight, in wind, in mountain streams, in temperature gradients of all sorts wherever found, in coal, in fossil oil, in radioactive ores, in green growing things. Especially in ocean depths and in outer space energy is free for the taking in amounts lavish beyond all human comprehension.' In the story, Shipstone quits his job, retreats to his basement and invents a technology that packs 'more kilowatt-hours into a smaller space and a smaller mass than any other engineer had ever dreamed of. To call it an "improved storage battery" (as some early accounts did) is like calling an H-bomb an "improved firecracker."' Like Ward and Musk [1], Shipstone eschews patenting his new technology in order to deny others the opportunity to steal it (or tie him up in court cases) and instead begins manufacturing the devices (eponymously named "Shipstones") which end up becoming ubiquitous, powering everything from flashlights and automobiles, to households and ocean-going ships. The company he founds becomes the largest and most powerful industrial conglomerate in the galaxy and the method of manufacturing Shipstones remains a closely-held secret. [1: http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-patents-2012-11 http://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-patents-2012-11 ]
  - 13y ago