10 Comments

I call "I notice that I am confused" on this one - it strikes me as remarkably similar in structure to what I recall reading about the Dean Drive as a kid, and I guess/predict that the reality is not as described in the article.

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The secret to spontaneity is preparation.

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We are only now discovering that our systems of knowledge capture, while mostly sufficient for the 20th century, are not substantial enough for the 21st, and will need complete revision in the years ahead for knowledge and technology to further enable progress.

That appears to be a quite bold statement. Can you elaborate?

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Sounds like the typical snake-oil

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According to Wikipedia, it's not that Ward "was never interested in the money." In fact, he tried to sell it, but demanded 51% of the profits, and no one took him on it. The story is also less sad than implied, as he apparently passed the recipe on to his family before dying.

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I agree with the astonishment that it's been known of for decades, yet still remains a secret. And for that matter, it isn't at all clear why it was never commercialized. It seems that the inventor wanted to make money off of it, and the product itself seems like it ought to be quite valuable ... and yet, there doesn't seem any record of it being incorporated into any real products. Why not?

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What CPV wrote: "The romantic self-educated crackpot with a great new idea may not be extinct, but he is on the way out."

This is indeed what we all thought in the 20th century. It seemed that money could find every important contribution that actually mattered enough to include it as a part of progress. But alas, money is not as plentiful as knowledge and human skill. In fact, money has always randomly mined knowledge. We are only now discovering that our systems of knowledge capture, while mostly sufficient for the 20th century, are not substantial enough for the 21st, and will need complete revision in the years ahead for knowledge and technology to further enable progress.

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Thomas Edison and other prolific inventors tend to innovate through deductive reasoning from established principles and inductive reasoning through trial and error (i.e. talent, education and hard work). I wouldn't call that "random."

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While innovation may have a random component, it typically occurs in communities of knowledge that have laid a foundation for it. These communities are now more democratic and disperse due to the internet, etc. The romantic self-educated crackpot with a great new idea may not be extinct, but he is on his way out.

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Wow. If this is real, it would seem similar to the surprise-level of high-temperature superconductivity. I don't have a subscription to New Scientist, but I found more info here. Overall, I find it difficult to believe that it is actually both real and yet remains unrevealed/unreproduced to this day, all due to the near-insanity of the inventor.

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