July 20, 2017
In Greek mythology, Daedalus [ded-l-uhs] (lit. ‘cunningly wrought’) was a skillful craftsman and artist in Greek mythology associated with the island of Crete, especially the labyrinth he built there to contain the Minotaur (part man, part bull). He is the father of Icarus (who flew too close the sun on wings his father designed), the uncle of Perdix (the mythological inventor of the saw), and possibly also the father of Iapyx (an Apollonian healer who aided Troy in the Trojan War).
Daedalus’ parentage was supplied as a later addition to the mythos, with numerous figures reported as his mother and father. Athenians rewrote Cretan Daedalus to make him Athenian-born, the grandson of the ancient king Erechtheus, claiming that Daedalus fled to Crete after killing his nephew Talos.
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September 8, 2014
Charles Proteus Steinmetz (1865 – 1923) was a mathematician and electrical engineer known as the Wizard of Schenectady. He fostered the development of alternating current that made possible the expansion of the electric power industry in the US, formulating mathematical theories for engineers.
He made ground-breaking discoveries in the understanding of hysteresis (the lag time when magnetizing a ferromagnetic material) that enabled engineers to design better electromagnetic apparatus equipment, especially electric motors for use in industry.
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February 5, 2014
Elon Musk (b. 1971) is a Canadian-American designer, business magnate and inventor. He is currently the CEO & CTO of SpaceX, a space transport company headquartered in Hawthorne, California, and CEO & Chief Product Architect of Silicon Valley carmaker Tesla Motors. He co-founded SpaceX in 2002 and e-commerce pioneer PayPal in 1998, and joined Tesla in 2004.
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June 4, 2013
Nathan Myhrvold (b. 1959), formerly Chief Technology Officer at Microsoft, is co-founder and 40% owner of Intellectual Ventures, a patent portfolio holding company.
Myhrvold, usually with coinventors, holds 17 U.S. patents assigned to Microsoft and has applied for more than 500 patents. In addition, Myhrvold and coinventors hold 115 U.S. patents assigned mostly to The Invention Science Fund I, LLC.
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March 19, 2013
Yoshiro Nakamatsu (b. 1928), also known as Dr. NakaMats, is Japanese inventor who has become something of a minor celebrity for the dubious science behind his inventions and his eccentricity. He regularly appears on Japanese talk shows which, in conjunction with his appearance, usually craft a humorous segment based on one or more of his inventions. He is a prolific inventor, and he even claims to hold the world record for number of inventions with over 4,000 patents.
In his interviews, Nakamatsu described his ‘creativity process,’ which includes listening to music and concludes with diving underwater, where he says he comes up with his best ideas and records them while underwater. Nakamatsu claims to benefit from lack of oxygen to the brain, making inventions ‘0.5 seconds before death.’ He also built a million dollar toilet room made completely out of gold that he claims helps make him think better. Nakamatsu also has an elevator in his house that he claims helps him think better. He strictly denies that it is an elevator, but rather a ‘vertical moving room.’ Nakamatsu’s goal is to live at least 144 years.
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March 15, 2013
Saul Griffith is an Australian American inventor. He is best known for his inexpensive technique for making prescription eyeglasses. This method uses two flexible surfaces and a pourable resin. Saul Griffith was born into an academic family, and encouraged to question all around him, to experiment as a process of learning, and to communicate effectively.
He won a scholarship to study Material Science at the University of New South Wales where he graduated in 1997 with a Bachelor of Metallurgical Engineering. In 2000, Griffith graduated from the University of Sydney with a Master of Engineering degree. He won a scholarship to MIT Media Lab to study towards a PhD that he completed in 2004. The subject of his PhD Thesis was ‘self replicating machines.’ They were one of the first instances of artificial replication being demonstrated using real physics.
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February 3, 2012
John Whitney (1917 – 1995) was an American animator, composer and inventor, widely considered to be one of the fathers of computer animation. Whitney was born in Pasadena, California and attended Pomona College. His first works in film were 8 mm movies of a lunar eclipse which he made using a homemade telescope. In 1937-38 he spent a year in Paris, studying twelve-tone composition under French composer Rene Leibowitz. In 1939 he returned to America and began to collaborate with his brother James on a series of abstract films.
During the 1950s Whitney used his mechanical animation techniques to create sequences for television programs and commercials. In 1952 he directed engineering films on guided missile projects. One of his most famous works from this period was the animated title sequence from Alfred Hitchcock’s 1958 film ‘Vertigo,’ which he collaborated on with the graphic designer Saul Bass.
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January 1, 2012
Michel Waisvisz [whyz-vizz] (1949 – 2008) was a Dutch composer, performer and inventor of experimental electronic musical instruments. He became the artistic director of STEIM (STudio for Electro Instrumental Music) in Amsterdam from 1981, where he collaborated with musicians and artists from all over the world. His involvement with STEIM goes back until 1969, when it had been co-founded by his mentor and friend Dick Raaymakers.
Waisvisz had a passionate dedication to a physical, bodily approach to electronic music which he has expressed in the use and presentation of his many developments of hardware and software instruments. From his point of view electronic music is created in direct musical interaction with individual technology, allowing for instant travels into sound through improvisation.
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December 20, 2011
Ron Popeil (b. 1935) is an American inventor and marketing personality, best known for his direct response marketing company Ronco. He is well known for his appearances in infomercials for the Showtime Rotisserie (‘Set it, and forget it!’) and for using the phrase, ‘But wait, there’s more!’ on television as early as the mid-1950s. Popeil learned his trade from his father, Samuel, who was also an inventor and carny salesman of kitchen-related gadgets such as the Chop-O-Matic and the Veg-O-Matic. The Chop-O-Matic retailed for US$3.98 and sold over two million units.
The success of the product caused a problem that marked the entrance of Ron Popeil into television. Chop-O-Matic was efficient at chopping vegetables, but it was impractical for salesmen to carry vegetables for demonstrations. The solution was to tape the demonstration; it was a short step to broadcasting the demonstration as a commercial. Some of his better-known products include: Mr. Microphone (a short-range hand-held radio transmitter that broadcast over FM radios), Showtime Rotisserie (a small rotisserie oven designed for cooking smaller sized portions of meat such as whole chicken and lamb),GLH-9 Hair in a Can Spray, and an Electric Food Dehydrator.
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July 25, 2011
Luigi Colani (b. 1928) is a German industrial designer. The prime characteristic of his designs are the rounded, organic forms, which he terms ‘biodynamic’ and claims are ergonomically superior to traditional designs. His ‘kitchen satellite’ from 1969 is the most prominent example of this school of thought. Many of his designs for small appliances are being mass-produced and marketed, but his larger designs have not been built, ‘a whole host of futuristic concepts that will have us living in pods and driving cars so flat that leg amputation is the only option.’
Colani responding to his critics said, ‘The earth is round, all the heavenly bodies are round; they all move on round or elliptical orbits. This same image of circular globe-shaped mini worlds orbiting around each other follows us right down to the microcosmos. We are even aroused by round forms in species propagation related eroticism. Why should I join the straying mass who want to make everything angular? I am going to pursue Galileo Galilei’s philosophy: my world is also round.’
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July 14, 2011
Ray Kurzweil (b. 1948) is an American author, inventor and futurist. He is involved in fields such as optical character recognition (OCR), text-to-speech synthesis, speech recognition technology, and electronic keyboard instruments. He is the author of several books on health, artificial intelligence (AI), transhumanism, the technological singularity, and futurism.
Ray Kurzweil grew up in Queens, NY. He was born to secular Jewish parents who had escaped Austria just before the onset of World War II, and he was exposed via Unitarian Universalism to a diversity of religious faiths during his upbringing. His father was a musician and composer and his mother was a visual artist. His uncle, an engineer at Bell Labs, taught young Ray the basics of computer science.
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May 9, 2011
Buckminster Fuller (1895 – 1983) was an American engineer and author. He popularized terms such as ‘Spaceship Earth,’ ephemeralization, and synergetics. He also developed numerous inventions, mainly architectural designs, the best known of which is the geodesic dome. Carbon molecules known as fullerenes were later named by scientists for their resemblance to geodesic spheres.
As a child he had trouble with geometry, being unable to understand the abstraction necessary to imagine that a chalk dot on the blackboard represented a mathematical point, or that an imperfectly drawn line with an arrow on the end was meant to stretch off to infinity. He often made items from materials he brought home from the woods, and sometimes made his own tools.
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