WI Einstein Raised In U.S. And Met Tesla

Tesla is today regarded as a man who was decades ahead of his time, but he either failed to get enough funding for his scheme of wireless electrical power or others like Marconi took credit for his work. WI he and an American-raised Einstein got to meet in the 1920s? How would their ideas have influenced each other, and could Einstein with his reputation have gotten Tesla's ideas to work? What would the world be like by the beginning of WW2 if he had?
 
Interaction between Einstein and Tesla would have accomplished little, because they played on two different fields. Einstein was a theoretical physicist, bringing together heretofore undefined aspects of matter and energy.

Tesla was a hands-on electrical engineer. He was a genius in his own right but in a domain different from that of Einstein. His lack of historical grandeur and personal poverty were the result of his complete inability to manage money or any proceeds from his inventions.
 
Ah, don't you be so realistic!

They would've built the .. how do you call it? Ah, yes: Chronosphere! And mammut tanks! And bears in cannons.. no! Bears WITH cannons!
 

Sachyriel

Banned
Tesla Prism Tanks on your mind Ion_StormH?

I mean, you probably could find a way with those two to alter the nature of energy traveling through a crystal and magnify it to become lethal and then add in some sort of feed-back to retrieve most of the energy.

But putting it on a tank seems like a waste. I'd put it on a Kirov.
 

Hendryk

Banned
WI he and an American-raised Einstein got to meet in the 1920s?
The previously raised objections notwithstanding, Einstein wouldn't need to be raised in the US in order to meet Tesla in the 1920s. By that point he was in his 40s and a Nobel Prize winner, and he could afford to travel around. In fact he visited New York in 1921.
 
Einstien was a mathy theoretical physicist; Tesla was a brilliant but irrational tinkerer. I doubt they'd even be able to contribute to each other's work, let alone collaborate.

Tesla Prism Tanks on your mind Ion_StormH?

I mean, you probably could find a way with those two to alter the nature of energy traveling through a crystal and magnify it to become lethal and then add in some sort of feed-back to retrieve most of the energy.

But putting it on a tank seems like a waste. I'd put it on a Kirov.

And isn't it weird that the Russians steal prism towers for all of fifteen minutes, and manage in that time to create one-hit-kill death towers with a rate of fire only slightly less than a chaingun? :rolleyes: Why don't the Allies copy them back?

SEALS level -3- taking Prism Tower & Plant.jpg

SEALS level -3- taking Prism Tower & Plant.jpg
 
Interaction between Einstein and Tesla would have accomplished little, because they played on two different fields. Einstein was a theoretical physicist, bringing together heretofore undefined aspects of matter and energy.

Tesla was a hands-on electrical engineer. He was a genius in his own right but in a domain different from that of Einstein. His lack of historical grandeur and personal poverty were the result of his complete inability to manage money or any proceeds from his inventions.

To be fair Einstein was also a patent agent and more practical than commonly believed. For example, surprisingly, he helped the US Navy with torpedo design during WW2.

The two working together would certainly be interesting IMO although time travel is unlikely to be the result.;)
 
There's something to be said for Einstein lending a little credibility to Tesla. Tesla had a habit of not writing down all of his ideas, and a more worrisome habit of taking money from investors and doing stuff with it that he wasn't supposed to. The OP's example of wireless power is exactly one such theft of invested funds (Tesla was Supposed to be building a radio tower). So even if Tesla did get his reputation boosted by Einstein I don't think Tesla would have done much with it.

But, giving him the benefit of the doubt:
He creates his wireless power system to broadcast electricity long distances without the use of wires, but soon runs into numerous problems. A lot of the power is lost in the transfer, far more than through wire transfer. Weather anomalies occur because of the electro-magnetic interference and animals that rely on electro-magnetics for navigation (eg: Birds) are severely disorientated. But this is nothing compared to the human cost, from the people living between the towers who can no longer turn off their lights because a circut through the air is constantly created. Even removing the light bulbs does nothing.

It'd be decades before such a thing would be attempted, with the advent of Nuclear power driving a desire to light up the world, but data from the first attempt and new tests there rises a correlation between intense exposure to radiation and cancer (Specificly in this case, to radio waves). Safety limits are placed on experimentation and development of radio technology, limiting technological development.

It isn't until the widespread development of the laser that wireless energy transfer is really thought of again. An experimental satelite is put into orbit with large solar pannels and a laser to transmit the power to Earth (In a remote desert location). It works wonderfully, and most people read about it in the daily paper (Wireless TV being put aside due to rising radiation concerns and cable TV infrastructure still being developed).

By 2008 the world is a much different place: Wireless internet, cell phones, and wireless TV never really developed. Laptops never became widespread as their use was tied to wireless internet. The cancer rate is much lower than OTL's, and large satelites are in orbit over most industrial nations, beaming down energy. But still, protestors are complaining that the energy being beamed from space is messing with the global temperature and weather patterns, leading to a "Global Warming" effect.
 
Interaction between Einstein and Tesla would have accomplished little, because they played on two different fields. Einstein was a theoretical physicist, bringing together heretofore undefined aspects of matter and energy.

Of course, Einstein's first break-through, pre-dating General and Special Relativity, was work on the photo-electric effect and much of his theory is derived from work on Maxwell's original equations describing the various relationships between electrical and magnetic fields.

Tesla was a hands-on electrical engineer. He was a genius in his own right but in a domain different from that of Einstein. His lack of historical grandeur and personal poverty were the result of his complete inability to manage money or any proceeds from his inventions.

They're perfect for each other. Einstein's theoretical know-how and Tesla's technical know-how are like two matching pieces of a puzzle.
 
There's something to be said for Einstein lending a little credibility to Tesla. Tesla had a habit of not writing down all of his ideas, and a more worrisome habit of taking money from investors and doing stuff with it that he wasn't supposed to. The OP's example of wireless power is exactly one such theft of invested funds (Tesla was Supposed to be building a radio tower). So even if Tesla did get his reputation boosted by Einstein I don't think Tesla would have done much with it.

But, giving him the benefit of the doubt:
-snip-
Perfect. :D
 
Tesla developed the AC induction motor and radio transmission coil before Einstein proposed relativity. As a person very much in tune with scientific development, not to mention an examiner of patents, it is very possible that Einstein's thinking was influenced by Tesla's applications.

Einstein came to the US in the thirties, just after Ernest Lawrence developed the cyclotron in California. How much did Einstein and Lawrence exchange ideas? It would have been a better more logical alliance than one with Tesla.

Now, if Thomas Edison treated Tesla with the respect he deserved, progress could have been made faster and inventions would have come sooner. But with Edison's fanaticism against alternating current electricity, it was not going to happen.
 
I think a US raised Einstein would be more into finding practical applications for things and maybe even bring them to the market.

At least during that era.
 
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