Date: Wed, 27 Mar 2002 18:13:58 -0500
To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>
From: Candy Madigan <candymadigan at mindspring.com>
Subject: [WSFA] Re: Interesting Inventions
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at keithlynch.net>

Ooh thank you!  That's exactly the kind of 'out of the box' thing I didn't
know I was looking for.  I was thinking of anecdotes of things like how
velcro was invented and post-it notes, but this is even better.  Although,
if anyone has any interesting anecdotes, I'll take them too.  DI is
Destination Imagination.  Her Improv Team just competed at county and
placed well enough to go to state.

At 06:06 PM 03/27/2002 -0500, you wrote:
>Candy Madigan wrote:
> >
> > Kindra's got DI practice tomorrow at noon, she needs to find out about
> > inventions.  Anybody know any interesting invention type stories?
> >
> > Candy
>
>DI? Drug Interaction?  Drill Instructor?  Deus Irae?  Former UK
>princess?
>
>SF has always had all kinds of inventions.  Remember Frankenstein?
>Analog/Astounding has always been the natural habitat of the "invention"
>story; see the annual collections.
>
>The collection "Venus Equilateral" by George O. Smith has a nice segue
>from pure techno- geek to pure social- impact- of- technology.
>
>Inventions can be things other than physical doodads.  In "Blood Music"
>[*] by Greg Bear, it's biological, in "Brave New World"[*] and
>"Island"[*], by Aldous Huxley, it's a form of social organization, and
>in "World of Null-A", by A. E. van Vogt, it's a form of education.
>
>For a cute parody of the Teenagers Discover Space Drive and Conquer the
>Cosmos plot, see "Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers", by Harry
>Harrison.  Personally, I think that "Spacehounds of IPC", by E. E. "Doc"
>Smith (which Spacehounds was parodying) was funnier.
>
>Or, if you want "real world" inventions, check out biographies of:
>
>Thomas Edison
>Nikola Tesla (patron saint of Mad Scientists)
>Edwin Land (Polaroid)
>Howard Hughes (before he succumbed to Billionaire Brain Damage)
>     (See the movie "Rocketeer" for a view of Hughes before he
>      went weird.  Interestingly enough, the Big Invention in the
>      movie was made not by Hughes, but von Braun.)
>the Wright brothers
>Alexander Fleming (penicillin)
>
>Most "inventions" are actually combinations of many small inventions.  A
>history of television is interesting here; there was no one big
>invention but a lot of little "way station" type inventions.  Also mucho
>politics.
>
>Factiod -- Will "Murray Leinster" Jenkins, when he wasn't writing SF,
>was a professional inventor.
>
>[*] May not be suitable for younger readers.
>
>--
>Steve Smith                                           sgs at aginc.net
>Agincourt Computing                            http://www.aginc.net
>"Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction has to make sense."

Candy