Re: Tesla Coil RF Transmitter

["Tesla list" <tesla@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Original poster: "Malcolm Watts" <m.j.watts@xxxxxxxxxxxx>

Hi Dave,

On 12 Oct 2005, at 19:21, Tesla list wrote:

> Original poster: Davetracer@xxxxxxx
>
> In a message dated 10/12/2005 4:23:37 PM Mountain Daylight Time,
> tesla@xxxxxxxxxx writes:
>
> I see a ton of wishful thinking and *no* hard data to back it up. In
> realtiy, Tesla had no idea how conductive (lossy) the ionized rarified
> air was as a conductor. There is no mention of how the "ray" was to be
> generated. In short he is rhapsodizing about what at that time was
> effectively science fiction. I find his real inventions much more
> appealing. We would literally be living a century ago without them.
>
> Malcolm
>
>      Malcolm, I suspect this is close to one of those "religious"
> style disputes, see also "What Computer Language is Best?" and "What
> Computer Model Doesn't Suck The Most", and, of course, "Linux versus
> Everything".

No - I will have another look at the CSN to see if he did produce
figures but I don't recall seeing them. My error perhaps.

>      I have an intuitive feeling that Tesla will have the last laugh
> on a lot of things. It tells me a lot that he succeeded in his wishful
> thinking of a spinning magnetic field (truly a tasty hack!),
> alternators, 3-phase, transformers (certainly more than meets the
> eye). Since he had the ability to visualize so strongly that he could
> "see" things (he was annoyed that they blocked his vision) we truly
> don't know -what- he was seeing; we can only give our best guess. And
> we have to rely on Tesla describing what he saw, and I've read a lot
> of Tesla, and just maybe, he's one of those people where you ask them
> what time it is, and they tell you how to build a watch ...

Which are the real inventions I was referring to.

>      However, I must point to the following paragraphs in your note:
>
>  >     "The advance of science to this point, however, is attended
>  with > terrible risks for the world.  We are facing a condition that
>  is > positively appalling if we ever permit warfare to invade the
>  earth > again.  For up to the present war the main destructive force
>  was > provided by guns which are limited by the size of the
>  projectile and > the distance it can be thrown.
>
>           In the future nations will fight each
>  > other thousands of miles apart.  No soldier will see his enemy.  In
>  > fact future war will not be conducted by men directly but by the >
>  forces which if let loose may well destroy civilization completely.
>
>          > If war comes again, I look for the extensive use of
> self-propelled air
>  > vehicles carrying enormous charges of explosive which will be sent
>  > from any point to another to do their destructive work, with no
>  human > being aboard to guide them.  The distance to which they can
>  be sent is > practically unlimited and the amount of explosive they
>  can carry is > likewise practically unlimited.  It is practicable to
>  send such an air > vessel say to a distance of four or five thousand
>  miles and so control > its course either gyroscopically or
>  electrically that it will land at > the exact spot where it is
>  intended to have it land, within a few > feet, and its cargo of
>  explosive can there be detonated. > >     "This cannot be done by
>  means of the present wireless plants, but > with a proper plant it
>  can be done. and we have here the appalling > prospect of a war
>  between nations at a distance of thousands of miles, > with weapons
>  so destructive and demoralizing that the world could not > endure
>  them.  That is why there must be no more war."
>      Of course this is a pretty good description of mechanized modern
> warfare with standoff weapons, and thermonuclear warfare by ICBM.

One can imagine scenarios which are not currently realizable in
practice. All of us have probably done it. Saying how it will be done
is another matter of course.

>      Tesla had the dubious distinction of being wrong in the short run
> -- World War I introduced ghastly chemical weapons -- and right in the
> long run.
>
>      Niels Bohr and Robert Oppenheimer insisted it would take a whole
> new jump in thinking to deal with atomic weapons.
>
>      Now I know we're drifting off-list, but my opinion, for whatever
> it's worth (2 cents?) is that Tesla nailed some things about the
> future pretty well, as you've shown. Certainly he did better than some
> of his contempories, like Madam Blavatsky, and he sure did better than
> the guy who insisted that all major scientific discoveries had been
> made and it was just cleanup from there on in. (I believe that was
> Lord Kevlin in about 1895 but am not sure, I just remember the gist of
> the quote).
>
>      Just as Max Planck was hesitantly, and with a real sense of
> horror, thinking up the word "quanta" and the concept of discrete
> packets of energy ...
>
>      Anyways, please don't take me too seriously --
>
>      -- grins,
>
>      David

Why not? I like what you said :)

Malcolm