Posted by Darren (208.143.232.66) on April 30, 2003 at 08:17:57:
In Reply to: Re: I'd like your opinions, regular posters posted by Nick Hall on April 30, 2003 at 07:37:57:
: Nick: I wasn't criticising Bessler! I was merely pointing out that reasons other than technical accuracy shaped his choice of words, spellings and endings (as in fact John Collins has just pointed out - see post above). He lived during the "age of letters) when the way one said things was as important as WHAT you said - hence his use of rhyming couplets. I don't know german - but I sent a key bit of the Apologia in German to a German friend who came back with several variants for key words. His opinion was "quirky" - not mine.
I apologize for that whole "quirkiness thing. I also hang out on several maling lists where some seriously angry skeptics hang out. I took you for one of them there skeptic guys. Sorry :-)
: Nick: Bessler's own comments (as reported in John's book)
: Perhaps "mislead" was too strong - let's say he used 'metaphorical allusion' rather than downright lies.
Yes, I would agree with that.
: Nick: Relax - I`m a believer! I didn't mean that he tried to con them about the fact of a working wheel - but that he was very "careful" not to give away the simple clue which lay behind the secret.
Again, sorry, took you for one of the mean old skeptics. My fault. You're statement above is true. He was careful not to give it away and I know why... it's stupidly simple. I could give describe it in under 30 seconds and everyone on this list would instantly understand it. He had to be very vague because it's not a complicated mechanism so there's not much you *can* say about it without giving something away.
: Nick: I`m sure - that is a common experience with "eureka" moments in wheel design. I have done this hundreds of times myself - suddenly thought "That's it!" then gone through the "clues" to see if the proposed device "fits" what Bessler said - Yes! Only problem - it doesn't work... :)
I haven't been there yet. Yes, I've had lots of eurekas, lots of designs, several have fit many clues, but I've never run across one that fit *all* the clues, and the writings, and the eyewitness accounts, and the behaviors... until this one.
: Certitude is a strange feeling - without Newtonian mechanics, I`m sure it could lead people half crazy building hundreds of "must work" models (BTW Bessler himself was in the same state for several years before his final triumph...)
You can say that again.
: Nick: I would _never_ say his writings were insane - or rants come to that.
I thought they were. For a while there I figured the stress of either A) holding together a complicated fraud, or B) trying to get people to understand that it *was* real was driving him nuts.
: Darren: Which reminds me... if someone invents something totally novel and totally useful in 1727, but then it's lost for alomst 300 years... can you then build one and patent it in the year 2003 or will someone cry "prior art?" Probably a silly question... just curious.
: Nick: My research on this indicates it is the sort of question that will force you to pay a patent lawyer a lot of money before you get an answer that will hold up if the patent is challenged later...
But who would challenge it? Bessler's descendants? His homeland country? Other people on Bessler's behalf?
: I feel sorry for whoever does solve the Bessler wheel problem.
There's that stomache ache again...
: As soon as his application (and MODEL!) hits the patent office, he is likely to be beseiged by probably hundreds of other wheel developers all of whom will have some justification in saying "He has used a principle that I thought up...."
Agreed. arg
Thanks Nick,
Darren