Sign Up Now
Get instant access to over 1 million+ study documents
OR
Already registered? click here to login
By creating your account, you agree to our terms of service, privacy policy and student honor code.
A metal wire or cable ran from the rod, down the side of a building and into the ground. When lighting struck, the electricity followed the cable down into the ground and prevented damage to the building. Franklin thought of the lightening rod in 1750, but it was three more years before he perfected it. (Bell 10). Franklin believed that the lightning rod was his most important invention, and it surely saved many buildings and lives since then.
In Franklin's time, the street lamps were very inefficient and the glass globes became dark with soot from oil burned inside. They needed to be cleaned daily. Franklin recognized that the problem had to do with lack of airflow inside the globe. In his Autobiography (126-127), he describes the improvement he made to street lights: "I therefore suggested composing them of four flat panes, with a long funnel above to draw up the smoke, and crevices admitting air below, to facilitate the ascent of the smoke; by this means they were kept clean, and did not grow dark in a few hours, as the London lamps do, but continu'd bright till morning."
Another Franklin invention used today is the extension arm, which is still advertised on TV commercials today. After founding a library in Philadelphia, Franklin spent a great deal of time in the stacks. In order to reach the books on the upper shelves, he created a device had two "fingers" that were attached to the end of a long piece of wood or pipe. The fingers could be opened or closed by pulling on a cord that manipulated them (PBS).
Other inventions used today include the odometer that he attached to his carriage and counted the rotations of the wheels...
No one knows if he was joking or really believed in what he told the Parisians.
In Italy, a letter about America written in the 1700s praised the "genius" of Franklin "due the invention of the Pennsylvania stove, an invention worthy of the conquerer of lightning, namely, of the celebrated Mr. Benjamin Franklin"(Pace 78). Genius was the correct word for Franklin. Throughout his life he continually thought of new ways to help others through his inventions, which are still as advantageous today.
Resources Cited:
Bell, Carrie L. Draw the Lightning Down: Benjamin Franklin and Electrical Technology in the Age of Enlightenment. Berkeley, CA.. University of California Press, 2003.
Goodman, Nathan G. The Ingenious Dr. Franklin: Selected Scientific Letters of Benjamin Franklin Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press
Pace, Antonio. Benjamin and Italy. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1958.
PBS. The Little Things. Retrieved April 18. 2008. http://www.pbs.org/benfranklin/l3_inquiring_little.html
Franklin, Benjamin. Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin. New York Macmillan, 1914.
A van Doren, Carl. Benjamin Franklin and Jonathan Edwards: Selections from Their Writings. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. 1920.
Resources Cited:
Bell, Carrie L. Draw the Lightning Down: Benjamin Franklin and Electrical Technology in the Age of Enlightenment. Berkeley, CA.. University of California Press, 2003.
Goodman, Nathan G. The Ingenious Dr. Franklin: Selected Scientific Letters of Benjamin Franklin Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press
Pace, Antonio. Benjamin and Italy. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 1958.
PBS. The Little Things. Retrieved April 18. 2008. http://www.pbs.org/benfranklin/l3_inquiring_little.html
Com). Although basic trackball mice are still commercially available, they have been largely overshadowed by newer versions of the computer mouse based on optical and laser technologies. All computer mice allow the user to control the position of a cursor on the screen (or alternatively, a player position in a game) as the trackball, optical or laser sensors detect user movements and translate those into digital input. The mouse devices
China Eight inventions of the ancient Chinese include paper money, gunpowder, papermaking, the compass, printing, the noodle, the abacus and the kite (No author, 2005). Of these, four that can be considered to be ingenious were the compass, gunpowder, paper money, and the noodle. This paper will take a closer look at those four, their invention and what these inventions have meant for society. All of these inventions have had deeper
Otherwise, during long stretches of straight roads, power steering is not necessary. Still used on almost all late twentieth-century commercial automobiles, power steering systems have not changed substantially in their basic principles since they were first developed as hydraulic systems in the middle of the twentieth century. Recently power steering systems have improved dramatically. Nice (nd) notes that power steering does consume fuel and so automobile engineers have been striving
Nanotechnology attempted to show the potential of this new technology and included the wide range of fields that are connected to the concept of the nanometer scale. These include machining, imaging, metrology or measurement, micromachines, instrumentation and machine tools, scanning probe microscopy, fabrication of components, nanoelectronics, molecular engineering, among others. (Journal Review: Nanotechnology) Another important step in the development of this technology in both a practical and theoretical sense was
Thomas Kuhn (1922-1996) was an American scientist, historian and philosopher who wrote a controversial book in 1962 called The Structure of Scientific Revolutions. Kuhn was born in Cincinnati, Ohio and from an early age expressed interest in science, particularly physics; obtaining his BS degree in physics from Harvard in 1943. He stayed at Harvard for his MS and PhD, and credits the period of the late 1940s in helping him
Her works emerged from dreams and visions she had since childhood, as her hands were being guided by the wonders of God to show divine presence in the world. Giant birds, biblical figures, complex flowers, mysterious faces, and other spiritual images adorned her pages. Once she began drawing, nothing stopped her, not poverty, or the claim by family members and friends that she was "crazy," or her lack of