Telsa was:Re: SSTC As a transmitter.

["Tesla list" <tesla-at-pupman-dot-com>]

Original poster: "Jim Lux by way of Terry Fritz <twftesla-at-qwest-dot-net>" <jimlux-at-earthlink-dot-net>



> 
> Funny really. When I learned elec eng many years ago, lots of time
> was spent studying motors, generators, transformers, stuff like
> that in a lot of detail. I recall Tesla's name figuring prominently
> in all of this, and to me he has always been just another of those
> many well known discoverers of electrical phenomena.  It's only in
> the recent couple of years that I've come to realise that there's
> this whole weird new age cult in persuit of the guy. 

OF course, you know that Marconi and Tesla (as well as Edison and Elvis)
are in a secret base on a tepui in Venezuela, being kept in good health by
"visitors from afar" ...


> engineer.  Perhaps he reserved this style for public consumption,
> for raising finance, but he does seem to have the habit of making
> extraordinary statements and claims, without qualifying them with
> answers to the obvious questions raised by their apparent
> indifference to the laws of physics.  What we seem to find when
> looking at his writings and descriptions of things, is that as we
> draw closer to the core principles or key functional details of

Particularly so in later writings... I think that he became more of a
"showman" as he got older.  I've read that he was, at times, the "talk of
the town" and prized as a dinner guest and raconteur (with that exotic (and
dangerous) hint of Balkan/Continental about him).  

As fashions (and finances) changed, I suspect he fell out of favor in the
social whirl, and become a bit more extreme and showy.  Also, at a time
when new inventions were coming out everywhere, he probably had to make
ever more florid and fantastic predictions to get investors interested.


 
> Have you noticed how many times you come across some situation in
> which people are arguing over the interpretation of some statement
> made by Tesla?  You hardly ever find this with other engineers and
> scientists of the day. They almost invariably spelled things out
> with great thoroughness, taking pride in the clarity of their
> expositions. In particular, whenever a controversial argument was
> presented, it would come equipped with well constructed responses
> to the obvious questions which fellow experts in the field would
> be certain to ask.  I've yet to come across this sort of dialogue
> in which the obvious problems that we mention here are dealt with.

I don't know... there were some pretty famous disputes going on in the 19th
century: source of the Nile, exploration of Africa and South America, etc.
with wild aspersions cast, suspicious suicides, and all manner of dispute.
Perhaps in the physical sciences your statement may be true (because all
the wailing and thrashing had already been done earlier?).  Look at the
disputes (to this day) about evolution and natural selection.  I remember
going to a university lecture in 1974 (when I was still in 8th grade) where
a guy was presenting the, at the time, somewhat novel theory of plate
tectonics, and just getting all manner of hostile abuse from members of the
audience. Sure, both sides had well constructed responses, but that didn't
stop all the thrashing around.