Amazing, incredible, TRUE invention story
(Reposted with minor edits from my old website 12/21/03)
You might get discouraged about the future, but wait – there is something amazing hidden in the human spirit. The January ‘04 Scientific American reports the astounding story of Curt Herzstark, inventor of the mechanical Curta calculator. He conceived and and designed this ingenious device while a prisoner in the Nazi Buchenwald concentration camp.
Herzstark actually drew the plans, including specifications and dimensions, to make himself too interesting for his Nazi guards to kill. “My God,” he thought, “If I can make this calculator, I can extend my life. Right there I started to draw…”
Think of a durable hand-held mechanical calculator, using precision gears and cams, the size and shape of a small pepper grinder. It delivered answers to 11 significant digits. Its precision and complexity are mind-bending, its elegance and versatility, beautiful to behold. It could do an enormous range of functions, and was eventually used by astronomers, surveyors, engineers, and accountants. Built to last a lifetime, these calculators are now fetching $800 on eBay and remain popular with vintage ralley drivers.
When the allies bombed the camp, Herzstark escaped into the forest, taking his plans with him. He roamed post-war Europe trying to get industrial backing for his calculator, and eventually succeeded in getting a machine shop to help him make three working prototypes. So perfect were his drawings that the design was unchanged from his prison-camp originals.
Sometimes I hear people lament that because of war, pollution, global warming, or [insert calamity here] that the human race is doomed to extinction. Well, “not likely, Homer.” Humans evolved in a jungle but came to prominence during an ice age. The human mind is endlessly adaptable and creative; the human spirit proves itself over and over to be more than a match for any kind of adversity.
Take the chance to celebrate human genius, and to marvel at the indomitability of these melon-soft bipeds. Yes, we have some stupid or immoral individuals, but we also have the other kind too. Given even the smallest chance to succeed, a tiny opening, they’ll work wonders, and make us wonder why we let our trivial problems hold us back.
Curta Links:
- http://curta.org
- http://www.vcalc.net
- http://home.teleport.com/~gregsa/curta/
- http://www.curta.org/wiki/CurtaAlgorithms
That is remarkably cool.
Well, that’s one way to look at it, but there’s a sort of cold genius in other things that we do; like kill or exploit each other leading to short term efficiencies that get us power and trophy mates.
I was watching TV this morning (CNN – Endangered Planet) and they were talking about chameleon like creatures that were so highly specialized that their very existence depended on the a specific type of tree. My immediate thought was, “Well, what would happen to these creatures when we cut down those trees to make parking lots and strip malls? And premium quality toothpicks to go with $1000 pizza.”
I’m sort of in that other camp—that coercion, and heavy handed coercion, will need to be used to keep the use of resources in check. If we don’t use coercive measures, we’ll just let individual freedom take us into areas that nature didn’t really intend. Our intellect is multiplied by technology, and the fleshy parts are mainly concerned with fueling itself with all the delicious things around us.
Resources, that is exactly what they are, nothing more, nothing less. Nature herself has wiped out more species than man-kind could ever account for. Extinction is the way of the world, lke it or not, evolution can’t and won’t be stopped. Is the little creature you described important, who knows, but it seems like by its very nature it is doomed, the fact that it is totally dependent on one species of tree seems to indicate faulty planning on mother natures part. Adapt or die is the rule, we didn’t make the rule, nature did.
I don’t think “nature” “intends” any such thing, one way or another. And nature has had no problem with species specializing themselves into extinction before—as well as species (or large populations) exceeding the carrying capacity of their environment and undergoing mass die-backs or extinction.
That’s the result of specialization, that we can take a lesson from (harken back to 25 skills men should know, or the basic 4-year degree programs in vogue).
I also think the issue is that we’ve reached the point that we extend the ecosystem on demand with little to keep us in check. Did nature intend to have one species extend the ecosystem like this? Hard to tell, but in the end, I think it’s self-correcting (by depletion, exhaustion, extinction). I appreciate DOF’s view of “ain’t we a peach” (humans), but I read that view as hubristic and sheltered; probably just a philosophical difference in upbringing.
I’m trying to engage in a little optimism – hoping that in light of everything else we’ve adapted to, we can adapt to the dangers of our own power. Herzstark adapted in an ingenious way to an impossible situation. There’s room for inspiration in that.
And I agree with Ted that one of those adaptations will have to be coercion, with some kind of bright line drawn between environmentally necessary coercions and those that only serve the power of the state for its own sake. How to draw that balance is one of those complicated problems we humans should be working on instead of throwing slogans at each other in prime-time news programs.
I don’t believe nature has intentions – as the most powerful critters on the planet it’s our terrible responsibility what happens.
I was just anthropomorphizing nature as a figure of speech. What I meant is that our big brains have primitive elements to them that will lead us to individual survival and efficiency at the expense of others.
Regulation and self-regulation are different. One can look at the obesity rates in America so see what self-regulation leads to given enough fuel and freedom. When we ship processors, we include a heat sink, a fan, and sensors that regulate it’s speed and heat output. Why? Because it works better and is more predictable. If we don’t regulate it/constrain it, it burns out or stops working.
I will never understand the idea of capitalism and how someone can think that the purpose of being a human on planet Earth is to use as many resources as possible while not caring or thinking about the consequences of such actions. I’ll stop here and save the discussion for a Capitalism thread.
The calculator above is truly amazing, and to think what people can create is mind boggling.
Except that’s not capitalism. It is (darkly described) consumerism. Not that capitalists cannot be as thoughtless and wasteful as you indicate—there are no immediate disincentives to it (though there are long-term ones), but that’s not the purpose of capitalism.
But I digress to another thread, too, I guess.
I think I know where a revivial of Thornton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth might go down well. Strange, but that’s twice in one week that someone’s post suggested that play to me.
I guess it does fit in to the Antrobus’ family story, or maybe into my favorite beer commercial.