The Lost Art of Inventing the Future

Recent events have pushed me deep in thought on the practicality of invention and creation. Even thinking. As the human race becomes still divided over things such as religion, race, politics, money, energy and land, in some ways, we seem no further advanced than the generations we judge to be primitive.

A system of trust has been challenged, and in some cases, broken. And it has caused us great suffering. Resulted in death. And even greater economic uncertainty. While it might be convenient to blame other people, political institutions or media, that won’t fix the situation. Accountability was replaced with convenience. COVID-19 made that worse. But the ability to think for ourselves is what differentiates us from the rest of the animal kingdom. We just choose to do it less.

It should come as no surprise that feeble minds reject radical change and thinking. Especially if they have something significant to lose at the expense of the change or thought. It is history that remembers the great ones. And usually through the scientific rigor and process of inventing things, having them tested and challenged, and then adopted to further the human race. When these things feed into the human convenience loop you can fully appreciate the impact. We need better incentive alignment. And to think beyond election cycles and adopt a multi-generational approach.

Given my obsession (an unspoken truth) with Ethereum and blockchain technology from a practical standpoint, it is an inevitable path that you end up studying the history of people, things and inventions. For example, we don’t get Ethereum today, were it not for the important work of Alan Turing. A fascinating and brave character. His impact on the world is still being felt. Yet, he was not publicly acknowledged for his contributions to WWII, computing or cryptography, until after his death. He was shamed and pushed out of society for reasons inconsistent with the times. We must be careful to not repeat those mistakes. Or we risk never knowing their greatness.

One of the most famous inventors of today is Elon Musk. While people obsess about the commercial terms of the Twitter acquisition, so much about him is being lost in superficial debate. Elon invented or significantly evolved companies, and advanced many fields. Space travel (SpaceX), solar energy (SolarCity), global communications (Starlink), online payments (X.com / PayPal), self driving technology (Tesla), artificial intelligence (Neuralink), high speed subterranean travel (HyperLoop) and commercial tunneling (Boring Company). I am trying to understand what motivates a man who has many strange traits, is of super intelligence, has more resources than any other inventor before him, demonstrates humility (at times), remains ultimately human (taking his Mom to the Met Gala) and insatiably curious. People might search his migration from South Africa, through Canada and landing in the US. Or his family history and relationships. But I suspect it’s more obvious. He had a hero (at least in ideas).

Imagine a character. So audacious and intelligent. But socially outcast, without sufficient resources and burdened with somewhat of a mental affliction. This character had ideas on how to propel the human race into the future. Despite his general views on society being a little outdated. This character couldn’t achieve his greatness, or fully realise his ideas. And would die a somewhat indignant death. Were it not for his commitment to documenting his ideas and scientific rigor, we might have lost the opportunity to know this forever. This character is Nikola Tesla.

I have passively read about Tesla. And learned about his life and ideas through traveling, and watching some of the more embellished stories of his life on the big screen. Why do people do great things? Whether they make money. Or not. Whether the current systems of government and industry welcome it. Or not. They do it because there can be no other way. They don’t ask for permission. They don’t wait for approval. Sometimes they take people with them. Sometimes they go alone. But they are people of action. People of work. Increasing human energy.

In trying to understand the evolution of software, I wanted to lean into the challenges in manufacturing and hardware. And then it dawned on me. Elon Musk has picked up the gauntlet from Nikola Tesla. And he’s inspiring the next generations who might take it from him. Twitter might be the platform that can ensure that level of access. Ensure his voice is heard, and promote the voices of others. Regardless of whether everyone agrees or disagrees with them. Freedom of thought is useless if we cannot express it.

I might be well off base here. And that doesn’t matter. But I thought it was worth doing some digging and pulling out some nuggets from Tesla’s musings and notes, and sharing.

Nikola Tesla, born in Smiljan, Croatia (modern-day) on 10 July 1856, died in New York City, NY, USA on 7 January 1943.

THE ONWARD MOVEMENT OF MAN — THE ENERGY OF THE MOVEMENT — THE THREE WAYS OF INCREASING HUMAN ENERGY

Tesla had an affliction due to an extraordinary excitability of the retina. Which caused him discomfort and anxiety. But would grant him a unique talent. The appearance of images in his eyes, that would represent his thoughts, both conscious and subconscious. His ideas would be represented so vividly, it pushed his ideas into the laboratory. With this talent, he predicted commercial air travel based on the innovations with aluminium, advancements and redundancy in metallurgy (iron, nickel, copper, aluminium), drone technology, robotics, self navigating vehicles, artificial intelligence, solar power, battery storage for energy, fluorescent lighting, electrical power points (single direction supply), radio, WiFi, interplanetary communication, sonar and terraforming planets such as Mars.

Like all humans, Tesla was imperfect. But it is arresting that he warned us about; a war on drugs, the importance of water and the impacts on the human race, the likely impact on health caused artificial foods, the importance of soil health and the critical urgency to preserve our forests.

His ideas about the role of women which were consistent with conservative Christian views at the time, are clearly outdated now. He had strong vegetarian beliefs before it was cool or you could post it on Instagram. These being more a matter of opinion than scientific.

And he believed that extraterrestrial intelligent life was very likely. We might have to wait a little longer for that one.

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