The Weirdest Genius Of All Times
Strange, Inspiring
Physics
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Science Story
Topics: Physics, Electricity, OCD
Key personalities: Nikola Tesla
Country: USA
Time: Late 19th Century
What makes story captivating?
It's a story of one among the most brilliant, prolific and eccentric scientific and engineering geniuses the world has ever produced but whose eccentricites lead him to die unrecognized and penniless.
Story:
Nikola Tesla was born on July 10th, 1856 in the village of Smiljan, located in what is now Croatia. Tesla's father was a priest and his mother was an inventor. At a young age, Tesla showed a great interest in invention and engineering. When he was 17 years old, Tesla enrolled in the Charles-Ferdinand University in Austria where he studied physics and mathematics. After graduating from college, Tesla moved to America where he would eventually become one of the most renowned inventors in history.
He could speak 8 languages- Serbo-Croatian, Czech, German, Hungarian, French, English, Italian, and Latin. This made him very valuable as a translator and engineer during his work with Edison. Tesla also had a deep interest in physics and engineering, which led him to many groundbreaking discoveries throughout his life. He is most famous for his invention of the alternating current (AC) motor and generator, the fluorescent light bulb, and the radio.
Tesla was a brilliant inventor who suffered from obsessive-compulsive syndrome, which shattered his reputation. He was known for his extreme cleanliness and his fear of germs. In fact, he would sometimes clean the same spot on the floor multiple times. Tesla's OCD led to him being labeled as a mad scientist and caused many people to doubt his inventions.
He was also known for his eccentric eating habits. Before he put a bite into his mouth, he would calculate the volume of food on the fork. He also believed that food should be eaten in small quantities and slowly to allow the body to properly digest it. Tesla's strange eating habits were likely a result of his obsessive-compulsive disorder, which caused him to have strict rituals and routines that he followed religiously.
If that's not weird enough, he was obsessed with the number 3. He believed that it was a special number that held some sort of power. He said that it was "the most magical of all numbers." Tesla used the number 3 in many of his inventions. For example, he designed a three-phase electrical system and used three coils in his Tesla coil. He also claimed that the ideal form for an electric motor was one with three poles.
Despite all these eccentricities, history doesn't have a better example of a futurist than Tesla. He predicted the invention of smartphones in 1926 and foresaw a future in which people would be able to use small, handheld devices to communicate with each other. He also envisioned a world in which these devices would be used for entertainment and education. Although Tesla's predictions didn't come true during his lifetime, they eventually became a reality thanks to the smartphones we use today.
Tesla died penniless and unknown on January 7, 1943, in New York City. He was one of the most brilliant inventors of all time, but his inventions were often stolen or patented by others. He never received the recognition he deserved in his lifetime. However, his work has been recognized in recent years and he is now considered one of the most important inventors in history.
A couple of interesting facts about Tesla
- As you may have guessed, the company Tesla run by Elon Musk is named after him
- Christopher Nolan's fascinating movie on magicians, 'The Prestige', has Tesla as one of the important characters
Topics
Physics, Electricity, OCD