News for hackers. Stuff that matters.

A comment on China wants to become a semiconductor superpower, budgeting $100B to achieve it. Parent comment

Re:China wants to become a semiconductor superpower, budgeti... by tw04 on Saturday January 30, 2016 @10:00AM (#11002007)
>e.g. Tesla

And how much more would we have gotten from Tesla if he hadn't been in financial ruins? He's probably proof positive that without the financial incentive/backing, the world loses out on countless inventions.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:China wants to become a semiconductor superpower, budgeti... by Niten on Saturday January 30, 2016 @03:12PM (#11003528)
Nikola Tesla was a great engineer and innovator—and showman—who's been mythologized beyond all reason.

Even at the time, Tesla's greatest contributions were being simultaneously discovered by contemporaries like Galileo Ferraris. Discovery marches on, and is more a product of the existing body of scientific knowledge than of any one man.

There have been too many other great minds in physics and electrical engineering for it to be remotely plausible that we've missed out on "countless inventions" that would be available to us today, if only Tesla had more money for his experiments.

[ Parent | on HN ]
Re:China wants to become a semiconductor superpower, budgeti... by tw04 on Sunday January 31, 2016 @12:51AM (#11005409)
Which is why we're just now starting to get wireless power 70 years after his death...
[ Parent | on HN ]