Month: October 2023

A photo from the Saturday Evening Post, 1958.

Nothing special, just people relaxing by the seaside in Uzbekistan.

As noted in the comments, the mountains turned out especially well

What an interesting rendition of Primavera Porteña by Piazzolla https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YVRahGdl5bs It’s a prime example of “how not to hit the wrong keys”

Jeroen van Veen actually has a three-hour video on YouTube that you can listen to for half a day

I continue to dig through archives. An article about robots from distant January 1928 by the president of MIT.

* The origin of the word “robot” is linked to Karel Čapek’s play “R.U.R.”, where smart machines called “artificial laborers” were presented. Initially, Čapek wanted to name them “labori”, but he was not satisfied with this choice. His elder brother, Josef Čapek, suggested the word “robot”, derived from the word robota (“hard labor” or “serf labor”).

* The latest achievements include: 1) a door that opens with the words “Open Sesame” 2) calculating tides/ebbs for all the world’s ports years ahead

* A voice assistant is mentioned, capable of responding to queries: “In another room at Washington a man picks up his telephone, calls for a number, and receives a response from a mechanical man — a Robot. He asks the Robot for certain information and receives an audible reply”.

* “… In many respects, the most remarkable of all robots is the recently developed Televox, invented by Mr. R.J. Wensley. As its name suggests, this is a voice-controlled mechanism at a distance. Remote control of mechanisms through electrical circuits is a familiar concept. A very weak electrical pulse can influence an electromagnet. When the magnet moves its core winding even slightly, it can release energies that were waiting for a signal to activate. Such a pulse can be transmitted either through direct wires or, as Senator Marconi mentioned in a recent interview, wirelessly. This means that boats can be controlled without a pilot, cars can be safely driven through traffic without a driver, and planes can be flown without a pilot at the controls.”

(By the way, the original “Televox” was not exactly voice-controlled, or rather, not voice-controlled at all. In its first version, it responded to a tuned tone. The emphasis on the word “Televox” was that the monotone sounds were to be within the vocal range for which the telephone network was designed. Originally three tones were tuned to 600, 900, and 1400 hertz. Here’s the patent – https://patentimages.storage.googleapis.com/ac/76/e0/3616e6bc258530/US1765471.pdf)

One of the photos shows a huge gyroscope. This is Metal Mike, installed on the Queen Elizabeth, the largest liner of that era. Under the author’s definition, it also qualifies as a “robot”.

Here’s another interesting story. At the beginning of the last century, one of the main problems in car manufacturing was engine knocking, which led to their damage and decreased efficiency. In the 1920s, General Motors developed tetraethyl lead—a supplement that successfully reduced engine knocks and increased the octane rating of gasoline, allowing engines to operate more efficiently. Together with “DuPont” and “Standard Oil,” General Motors created the Ethyl Corporation to market this.

The name “Ethyl” was specifically chosen to avoid scaring people with the word “lead.” The inventor of this, Thomas Midgley, was well aware of the dangers of lead poisoning and warned his superiors, but money was more important. Almost immediately, workers in the plants began to exhibit unstable gaits and mental disorders. Thus, in 1924, at one poorly ventilated facility, five workers died within a few days, and thirty-five others became disabled. Once in the body, the substance “pretends” to be calcium, accumulating in the bones and continuing to poison the body after the initial exposure. The result—millions of deaths, and a host of various side effects in people’s behavior.

“Ethyl Corporation” always adhered to the practice of firmly denying the toxicity of its product. For several decades thereafter, the main bulk of gasoline in the USA contained tetraethyl lead in its composition.

By the way, Thomas Midgley is also the inventor of chlorofluorocarbons (freons) for refrigerators. According to historian John McNeill, the inventor “had a greater influence on the atmosphere than any other living organism in the history of Earth.” He died at the age of 55: was strangled by his own mechanism.

Interestingly, some scientists have demonstrated a correlation between the level of crime in the second half of the 20th and the beginning of the 21st century and poisoning by tetraethyl lead in childhood, which led to developmental disorders of the central nervous system, and presumably resulted in increased delinquent behavior in adulthood, which presumably led to a rise in crime rates from the 1960s through the early 1990s. The drop in crime rates from the 1990s, according to this hypothesis, is explained by the reduced consumption of gasoline made using tetraethyl lead starting from the 1970s.

109 years ago in the Saturday Evening Post, electric cars were advertised. On the left — Henry Ford, on the right — Thomas Edison. The company Detroit Electric was founded in 1907. Detroit Electric cars used batteries developed by the Edison Storage Battery Company. The company ceased its operations in 1939. About 13,000 vehicles were produced during this period. In 2008, Detroit Electric was revived as a brand specializing in electric vehicles, but in a more modern context.

It is advertised that the cars could travel about 80 miles (130 km) on a single charge, with a recorded record of 211 miles (340 km) — apparently, on an enhanced battery and at a steady speed on a flat road.

It is claimed that the target audience was women and doctors, for reliable and instant starting without the need to manually crank the engine with a starter — well, remember such a handle that had to be turned forcefully.

By the way, they were called Electric Pleasure Vehicles back then.