Susan B Anthony, Margaret Sanger, Martin Luther, Martin Luther King, Jr, Andrew Carnegie, Sally Ride, Eliza Hamilton, Maurice Koechlin, Robert Owen, Willis Carrier, Norman Borlaug, Rosalind Franklin --
Thank you all. You've radically improved my life, and the world I live in. And many of you are virtually unknown.
This list is incomplete. What historical figure has radically improved your life yet is a near unknown, or whose achievements or philosophy are ignored due to other forms of celebrity?
I'd prefer to add women to this list. Preferably people with wikipedia pages.
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Steve Wozniak, Bill Gates, and Linus Torvalds
ReplyDelete(Steve Jobs is on the bubble, as he seemed more innovative in form rather than function)
John Hattan Making things cool and therefore sexy and sought after was an important thing Jobs did -- the gray boxes of the 80s were fugly.
ReplyDeleteI appreciate the add. Those guys, though, are all pretty famous, male, and the outcome of their actions is still tied to them in an appreciable way.
Ada Lovelace, computer scientist: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ada_Lovelace
ReplyDeleteMary Anderson, because I'm alive thanks to her invention
ReplyDeletehttp://inventors.about.com/od/womeninventors/fl/Mary-Anderson-Inventor-of-the-Windshield-Wiper.htm
Damn, how did I forget Ada Lovelace. She invented the entire notion of a machine fulfilling an algorithm. That's one of the biggest deals ever.
ReplyDeleteAnd that's not limited to computers. My clothes are made using that do algorithms. The growing of crops is controlled by algorithms, and implemented by machine. A car is really just a machine that does an algorithm. My ikea furniture is assembled by algorithm.
Hedy Lamarr
ReplyDeletewow, Arlene Medder ! The windshield wiper is a fantastic contribution. It is so obvious in retrospect that it is hard to imagine not existing. Thanks!
ReplyDeleteJosh Roby because of radio guidance now used in wifi?
ReplyDeleteAdmiral Grace Hopper.
ReplyDeleteFrances Oldham Kelsey, MD.
ReplyDeleteJohn Hattan Cool. For Cobol, right?
ReplyDeleteDespite its perception today, COBOL (along with Lisp) were probably the most innovative computer languages ever written. It was compiled. It was designed to be independent of computer hardware. It had database operations built-in.
ReplyDeleteAnd it's still in use today. Every time you swipe your credit card, there's probably some COBOL code helping to do the processing :)
No doubt, John Hattan ! I was clarifying, not disagreeing. That's exactly the sort of long-term contribution with minimal fame that I'm looking for.
ReplyDeleteElizabeth Thompson, Kate Sheppard, Margaret Hamilton, Clara Barton, Nelly Bly, and most importantly : Hedy Lamarr actress and invented the tech that wifi is built on.
ReplyDeleteWilliam Nichols She was also a good guest on Letterman. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1-vcErOPofQ
ReplyDeleteShe apparently did keep nanoseconds of wire in her purse and would give them to people on request :)
Dianne Harris Cool list.
ReplyDeleteElizabeth Thompson the painter?
Kate Sheppard, who got the first country (NZ!) to grant women the civil right to vote.
Margaret Hamilton, who programmed the Apollo missions and took us to the moon
Clara Barton, for the American Red Cross?
Nelly Bly, for investigative journalism into asylums?
Hedy Lamarr, yeah. I'm using wifi and didn't know her name.
Ida B. Wells, the journalist
ReplyDeleteHoly shit. "I will not begin at this late day by doing what my soul abhors; sugaring men, weak deceitful creatures, with flattery to retain them as escorts or to gratify a revenge."
ReplyDeleteShe was born into slavery, proved lynchings were used as racial control, and founded the NAACP. And she was kind of a socialist. Badass, Arlene Medder !
William Nichols
ReplyDeleteRead her Rejected Princesses entry. Heck, read any Rejected Princess entry. They'll blow your mind.
Yes, Thomson was one a the first women to be recognized as an artist in the official British system for art. She was also one of the first to paint war as it was, messy and disjointed.
ReplyDeleteAnd Nelly Bly reinvented investigative journalism, and possibly invented the 55 gallon oil drum.
.... the 55 gallon oil drum? Damn.
ReplyDeleteThere's an unsung hero!
Not a woman but damn this guy changed the world: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcom_McLean The Shipping Container. mic drop.
ReplyDeleteDianne Harris I just tried to look that up without success.
ReplyDeleteYeah, the shipping container changes everything. Inter modal, stackable, (mostly) standardized.
Of course, for it to work you need steel. That's one of two reasons Carnegie was on my list -- and I considered adding JP Morgan, too.
Mary Shelly- invented sci-fi
ReplyDeleteAlan Turning- proved the praticality of computing machines and also played a major role in ending ww2
Les Paul- the concept of modern music would be impossible without his inventions
Good list, David Rothfeder
ReplyDeleteI'd always wondered if Shelley was really before HG Wells. Turns out, war of the worlds was published in 1897 and The Modern Prometheus was in 1818.
Daaaaaaamn.
Shelly also completely out showed her husband who was also an author
ReplyDeleteMaybe. Either way, I'm not trying to compare Shelley's in this thread. Percy and Mary both did some great work, and are known in different genres. We can build up Mary without speaking to the detriment of Percy.
ReplyDeleteHenry Bessemer, Russel Ohl, Edmond Halley
ReplyDeleteCheap Steel, solar cells, and the existence of comets that 'round the sun, Tony Lower-Basch ?
ReplyDeleteCheap steel, both solar cells and every form of diode (including light-emitting diodes) ... and Halley is the guy who actually convinced Newton to publish rather than taking his insights to the grave. It apparently was quite an uphill battle against a reclusive madman.
ReplyDeleteHoly crap Halley also published a paper on annuities that led to them being properly priced, and then led to the the existence of actuarial sciences.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was pressure from Leibniz. who was about to publish his version of calculus.
ReplyDeleteAnd yeah, the calculus, the physics, and refraction are all different works of genius by Newton.
Dianne Harris the mathematics of risk continues to develop! I didn't know Halley had a hand in that, but he is about the right time period to do some important initial work.
ReplyDeleteRosalind Franklin (talk about unsung)
ReplyDeleteYep, Arlene Medder . She was on my initial list. Just last week, Dianne Harris asked me to turn off the radio, as they were airing Watson giving a TED talk about how he found DNA.
ReplyDeleteBest snap-back on the subject I've seen ... apparently a dialogue from an actual opening of a survey course on biology:
ReplyDeleteTeacher: Does anyone here know what Watson and Crick discovered?
Student: Rosalind Franklin's notes.
Thanks for this, everyone. I'm sure I won't remember all of them, but hearing about more awesome world changing women was great.
ReplyDelete