The Education of Thomas Edison

Alliance for the Separation of School & State ^ | Jim Powell

[Mighty Pen]

Food for thought. It just goes to show that parental guidance and personal initiative on the part of the child are the real factors needed to bring out the God-given talents in the children of America. Government assistance is NOT needed. If you'd like to help in the fight to end government controls of schools, visit www.sepschool.org. They are dedicated to this cause.

This is the second biographical sketch of a famous American hero lately. I hope to find more interesting bios and post them soon.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Thomas Edison was a great inventor but he was also a real scumbag and he wasn't always right. I consider the guy who invented AC power, Nicola Tesla, a much greater (but less known) inventor.

Edison tried to put a squash on AC power for his own personal gain. He's a real man of science all right. He started good but got blinded by the money and fame.

[Graewoulf]

You pen a mighty strong case for home schooling!

[Zon]

And what have you done to better civilization that is even one-one-hundredth as great as Thomas Edison?

[Zon]

I have nothing against 'home' schooling, but Edison was a very special case. He also had an IQ in the clouds.

But nothing! You don't suppose his high IQ was earned. No you claim it a gift from God thereby attempting to deprive a man the right to achieve greater than other men who choose different pursuits.

Da Vinci, Edison, Einstein, Newton, etc, these are very rare men and their gifts are not derived from their mom and dad but from God.

A common denominator shared by all mega-successful people is they relentlessly dug into what they were most passionate about and then figured out how to make money doing it.

[Excuse_My_Bellicosity]

Oh, you're right. If you're smart and are good at your vocation, then it is okay to lie, steal, and cheat.

[solzhenitsyn]

Mighty Pen, thanks for the fascinating article about a great American. I enjoyed it.

There are many factors that make this country great -- and prosperous. One of them is that we are a nation of individuals. Another is that our system rewards hard work and innovation.

[solzhenitsyn]

Re my assertion that "our system rewards hard work and innovation" -- please let me clarify that.

Our system of free enterprise rewards hard work and innovation, while our socialist government punishes hard work and innovation. Fortunately, the private sector is still bigger than government.

Putting aside the predations of the IRS, I wonder how much Edison would have accomplished if he'd had OSHA and the EPA to deal with. And you can bet Bonior, Dingell, and Waxman would have been all over him. There has to be something sinister about a fellow getting rich through his own hard work and ingenuity, especially if technological advancement is involved.

[weikel]

Newton made a ton of money.

[weikel]

He had made some money before the royal mint actually in real estate. Plus he was very "in" with the British upper class going way back to his days at Trinity college ( despite having a servant job I guess they simply liked him). He played at least a minor role in putting William of Orange on the English throne( he really hated James Stuart).

[Zon]

And what have you done to better civilization that is even one-one-hundredth as great as Thomas Edison?

Thomas Edison was a great inventor but he was also a real scumbag and he wasn't always right. I consider the guy who invented AC power, Nicola Tesla, a much greater (but less known) inventor.

Edison tried to put a squash on AC power for his own personal gain. He's a real man of science all right. He started good but got blinded by the money and fame.

2 posted on 1/18/02 7:04 PM Pacific by Excuse_My_Bellicosity

And what have you done to better civilization that is even one-one-hundredth as great as Thomas Edison?

[aruanan]

Although he seems to have briefly attended two more schools, nearly all his childhood learning took place at home.

Actually, most of his childhood learning took place aboard the trains he sold newspapers on and at the library while waiting for the afternoon train back home.

[Zon]

Relax. I don't 'equate' mega-success with the talent that only a few possess.

You just take it upon yourself to deprive a mega-successful man of fully deserving and full ownership to his success... depriving him of that to assert that a mega-successful man's work is a gift from God.

Da Vinci, Edison, Einstein, Newton, etc, these are very rare men and their gifts are not derived from their mom and dad but from God. 4 abwehr

[Skibane]

Excuse is on-target in this case. For the most part, Edison was indeed a scumbag. Most of his famed "1 percent inspiration/99 percent perspiration" was actually the sweat off the brow of the dozens of nameless lackeys he hired to "research" his ideas — By no measure should he be held up as a poster boy for hard work and perseverance.

[aruanan]

I consider the guy who invented AC power, Nicola Tesla, a much greater (but less known) inventor.

Well, it looks as though you haven't read much about either guy or you have some hitherto unknown definition of the word "greater" (Tesla didn't invent AC power--see Steinmetz for Theory and Calculation of Alternating Current Phenomena. It was a phenomenon already known and understood by at least a few. Tesla saw a way to use AC effectively and also saw later in a flash--much like Doc saw the flux capacitator--the principle of the rotating magnetic field. He was able then to develop an induction motor that would enable him to successfully use alternating current).

He started good but got blinded by the money and fame.

Ha ha ha. Yeah, and Communism started out good but got perverted by folks like Stalin. Edison started by inventing an automatic vote tallying machine for Congress not realizing that Congress didn't want an easy and quick way of voting because it would preventing them from bloviating from the floor. After that, Edison determined to spend his time inventing only those things that people would actually want.

[aruanan]

Putting aside the predations of the IRS, I wonder how much Edison would have accomplished if he'd had OSHA and the EPA to deal with.

Don't forget the SEC. The latter half of the 19th century was one of the most exciting times in U.S. and world history. If we had had government then as we do now (though that's when it got started) the tremendous creativity would have been choked to death.