Nikola Tesla
Saying Nikola Tesla is just an inventor, is like saying Da Vinci was just a good painter, guy was a visionary, way ahead of his times.
He came up with the concept of wireless communication, wireless power distribution much before any one else. Sadly post his death, most of Tesla's landmark work, fell into obscurity, and for a long time, he never really got his due. Also the fact that he was more of a recluse, had a certain kind of detachment, his life just revolved around science, nothing else.
Nikola Tesla was born at Smiljan, Croatia on July 10, 1856 his home is now maintained as a memorial and museum. Much like his long time rival, Edison, Tesla was also a university drop out, a genius though constrained by a rigid system. Unlike Edison, he dropped out of Austrian Polytechnic due to pushing himself too far, and also his addiction to gambling.
Tesla, initially began his career in the US with Edison Machine Works, he would later have a long standing rivalry with Edison. He quit Edison Machine Works, probably due to fact that his design for arc lighting street system was never accepted. His major rivalry with Edison though would be over adopting AC over DC or the War of Currents as it was called.He had already developed an induction motor that ran on Alternating Current(AC) that generated a rotating magnetic field to run motor .
Around the same time George Westinghouse was marketing the AC system, and Tesla's motor was something that suited him right up. He hired Tesla, as a consultant at their Pittsburgh's labs to implement an AC system for the city's streetcars. However constant conflicts with other Westinghouse engineers, over implementation of AC power, they had to use a DC traction. Around the same time, Edison was pushing for DC, claiming that AC was unsafe, even to the extent of proving it with live animals.
It did not help that Westinghouse itself was in financial trouble later on, and could not fund Tesla's induction motor. Irony is Westinghouse later ended up purchasing Tesla's patent on Induction Motor from GE for around 216K $. The larger irony is that GE, which sold Tesla's AC patent to Westinghouse was itself a merger of Edison with Thomposon-Houston. Most of Tesla's inventions while not very popular during his life time, were adopted later on, he was some one who thought ahead of his time
The Tesla coil for example is used a lot in Kirilian Photography used to capture corona discharges.Again it was Tesla who came up with the proposal to generate power from Niagara Falls, using a 2 phase AC generating system.
While Tesla did make good money through his patents, he could not really manage it well, and ended up losing a whole lot of it. Fact is he was more of a recluse, detached from the world, not very social, did not even marry and remained a celibate.
In a sense Tesla was a Yogi of sorts in the science world, living in his own world and thoughts, not interested in material world.Another reason why Tesla never really got his due, was his often forthright nature, honest to a fault.
Tesla, slammed Edison even on his death calling him "unremarkable" and was equally critical of Einstein's Theory of Relativity.Also Tesla's understanding of atomic structure, was totally at odds with the standard theory of atoms being made up of subatomic particles.
Tesla, slammed Edison even on his death calling him "unremarkable" and was equally critical of Einstein's Theory of Relativity.Also Tesla's understanding of atomic structure, was totally at odds with the standard theory of atoms being made up of subatomic particles. Contrary to the then accepted atomic theory, Tesla believed that atoms are immutable, though he could not really prove it.
To me, the universe is simply a great machine which never came into being and never will end.
Personally for me Nikola Tesla wud be G.O.A.T in modern science, he was not just an inventor, guy was one of the finest thinkers ever. He was a visionary, a man who saw the future, whose ideas while ridiculed during his time, are now accepted as default.