Stanford Ovshinsky: the greatest scientist you've never heard of?
ovshinskyday.weebly.com
ovshinskyday.weebly.com
The bonds that led to the bankruptcy were issued in 2008 by his replacement/
The trustee recently filed suit against 3 chineese companies saying ECD went bankrupt because of their price fixing.
Are you saying that because it went bankrupt 6 years after he left, that he was a bad businessman?
http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1000142412788732382910...
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142405270230344200457912...
It annoys me because the guy clearly had the equivalent of a Phd in materials science, he just didn't happen to get it at an accredited institution.
The annoyance comes from the people who read this and say "Gee, even somebody that never went to college can do this." rather than "Gee, you can learn anything even without attending a college if you have the drive." I got similarly annoyed when someone with a PhD makes an assumption that because someone doesn't have a PhD they must not be able to get a PhD, but knowledge isn't like that.
Rather than pitch this guy as someone with no formal education, we should hold him up as someone who chose to educate himself deeply in the subjects he was passionate about. To seek out knowledge and to hone his ability to separate truth from fiction, insight from platitude.
What I wanna know is how this guy put together an effective and cohesive curriculum instead of the scattered and unfocused one I tend to fall into when trying to self- educate.
In other words, if you have an actual problem, and you really need to solve it, that is the motivating and focusing force.
At least, I am guessing that's how he did it. I could be totally wrong.
Autodidacts can never hope to match the prior selection filter, but it seems conceivable that the knowledge level signal could be recreate through a credentialing equivalency test of some sort.
Like some kind of degree, issued by an accredited university?
Note that he's pretty old. I read a popular science/discovery magazine level bio of him in the 80s and he was old them. Unless this is his son following in dads footsteps? The relevance to being old is by analogy its impossible to get into the nuclear engineering biz in 2013 without a title of nobility, err, I mean a degree in nuke sci, but back in the 1940s the los alamos OG were shipping working product without the benefit of a title of nobility, err, I mean a degree. So its highly likely that when he was a kid and flooded lead acid was cutting edge high tech, there probably was no relevant title of nobility to bestow upon him when he was young, the field grew up around him such that a kid today could never break into the field without a title of nobility.
Your definition of "waste" appears to be something that you think is worth doing, but which does not make a profit. But if it is worth doing, why is it not making a profit? And if it is not worth doing, why put "waste" in quotes? People's time and effort would be better spent on something else.
Finally, if you want to spend your own time and effort (and money) on something that others might consider to be not worth doing, that's your choice. But when you talk about convincing others to "waste" money, you are no longer just committing your own time and effort (and money); you are committing theirs. The track record of this method of organizing human activity when not constrained by the need to make a profit (in order for the activity to stay in business) is not good.
wow. are you a fan of "Atlas Shrugged" by any chance? I will give you just one obvious counter example (though I could rattle off a huge list), which, if you are not sociopathic, should immediately make you see your mistake:
The Red Cross
Profit is a very poor metric for value to humanity. In fact it is a horrifyingly inhumane metric, and I would hope you feel shame for writing such rubbish publically.
But if that doesn't do it for you, I could also point out that you have just insulted everyone here who happens to work on open source software, by telling them their work has no value, and is a waste without scare quotes.
That's not to mention the day traders and bankers who make huge amounts of profits and contribute nothing of value to society.
Not really.
The Red Cross
Perhaps we are using a different definition of "profit". AFAIK the Red Cross is funded by voluntary contributions; in other words, people pay the Red Cross to do what it does, indicating that people find what it does worth doing. That meets my definition of "profit", but apparently not yours. So we may be talking somewhat at cross purposes.
Btw, the fact that the Red Cross and other similar organizations call themselves "nonprofits" is a subterfuge, so they can collect money, pay salaries to people, make purchases, have administrative expenses, and generally do all the same things that ordinary "for profit" businesses do, without ringing alarm bells with people who don't understand that the resources they use to do what they do have to come from somewhere; they don't just magically appear. In other words, they are forced to call themselves a "nonprofit" because most people have a faulty definition of what "profit" means.
In a sane world the Red Cross would be a normal corporation that was selling the service of helping people. If they made a profit, so much the better: more money to reinvest in helping people better. As it is, they have to hide what would normally be "profit" in various expenses that amount to the same thing, reinvesting profits in helping people better--but it's less efficient because of the subterfuge.
Profit is a very poor metric for value to humanity. In fact it is a horrifyingly inhumane metric, and I would hope you feel shame for writing such rubbish publically.
No, what is inhumane is to pretend that people can be helped and human welfare improved for free, magically, without any cost and without any expenditure of people's time and effort, as well as other resources--for example, to force organizations like the Red Cross to pretend to be "nonprofits" and waste resources on subterfuge that could otherwise be used to directly help people. I would hope you feel shame for writing such rubbish in public.
Profit forces us to face the reality that creating value takes time and effort, and forces us to make hard choices about which things will get done, out of all the things that could be done with the time and effort and resources at hand. There are other ways of making those choices, but on a large scale they all have worse track records than profit does.
you have just insulted everyone here who happens to work on open source software, by telling them their work has no value, and is a waste without scare quotes.
I have said no such thing. I write open source software myself; some of it is visible on the web (see the links at http://blog.peterdonis.com). But I write it because it is valuable to me; I don't need to be paid by anyone else because I already see the value. But the flip side of that is, I have no idea how valuable it is to anyone else.
For example, suppose there were some feature that could be added to one of my Python libraries that would be very valuable to someone else. So that someone else sends me an email saying, basically, can you add this feature? But they don't offer me any money; they just say the feature would be really valuable. How do I know how much of my time and effort that feature is worth? If I have no other information, the feature will get done when I have the spare time and interest (which may be never). But if the feature really is that valuable to them, they have one obvious way of getting my attention: offer me money. Now I have an easy way of judging whether the feature is worth my time and effort: I judge the money offered against the opportunity cost, i.e., what else I could do with that time and effort, and how much would it be worth to me? (Note that "how much would it be worth" doesn't necessarily mean in money; it might mean giving up time with my family and friends, and I might not be willing to do that for the money offered.)
For another example, look at a large open source project like OpenOffice. I filed a bug years ago asking if a "normal view" option could be added to the OpenOffice word processor, similar to the feature in MS Word (basically, you see the fonts and paragraphing as they will be in the finished document, but you don't see all the extra "page view" cruft that is in the default view in OO). Lots of people voiced support for adding the feature, and the OO project team agrees it's a good feature, yet it's never been added. Why not? Because they have no way of knowing whether that feature is worth more than all the other things the OO team has to do with their time and effort--which basically means they assume it isn't worth more, and the feature never gets done.
Most open source software falls into this category: what there is may be very good (I use OO quite a bit, and do not use MS Word except when forced to at work), but it tends to lack features that for-profit software has. The exceptions are mostly cases where there are for-profit entities backing the project up--the Linux kernel, for example--or where the open source project is an enabler for profits made through other means, like Android for Google. Again, that is by no means an insult to open source developers; as I said, I'm one of them. It's a recognition of reality: we all put our time and effort where we can see value. We can all see when things are valuable to us (btw, this includes things like the Red Cross--many people see value in helping other people, and the Red Cross is an expression of that); but we are not good at seeing how valuable things are to others, particularly when the others are widely distributed and diffuse. Profit helps to fill that gap.
First, donations are revenue, not profit; profit is revenue minus expenses. It is somewhat amusing that a post which makes this error complains about others having a "faulty definition of what 'profit' means."
Second, the term "nonprofit" is the less-formal term for a certain class of tax-exempt entity because part of the requirement for that tax-exempt status is that "part of the net earnings [...] inures to the benefit of any private shareholder or individual", that is, that the organization does not return profits to anyone. [1]
> In a sane world the Red Cross would be a normal corporation that was selling the service of helping people. If they made a profit, so much the better: more money to reinvest in helping people better. As it is, they have to hide what would normally be "profit" in various expenses that amount to the same thing, reinvesting profits in helping people better--but it's less efficient because of the subterfuge.
Except that this is not the case, because there is no requirement for the Red Cross not to have excess revenue above its expenses, it just can't have shareholders or other individuals to whom that excess is distributed.
[1] 26 USC § 501(c)(3); similar language appears in other paragraphs of § 501(c) defining other categories of tax-exempt non-profits, though § 501(c)(3) is the most important, and the one relevant to the Red Cross; http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/26/501
Yes, I know that. See my response to ZenPsycho.
there is no requirement for the Red Cross not to have excess revenue above its expenses
This is a valid point (and thank you for linking to the actual law governing this). However, I don't think it makes much difference to the point I was making. For one thing, it amounts to admitting that the Red Cross can make a profit, and that therefore profit and helping people can go together, which was my original point in this subthread. Also see below.
it just can't have shareholders or other individuals to whom that excess is distributed
First of all, that's not the only limitation. They also have to limit their activities to those that qualify for tax-exempt status. The law seems to have quite a bit of language intended to make it difficult to evade that requirement. So there is still an assumption that certain kinds of activities are "more worthwhile", independently of the question whether they make a profit.
Second, if there is an excess, what happens to the excess? Some of it probably gets put aside as a buffer for times when receipts are down. But other than that, what else does the Red Cross do with it?
Based on their recent financials, this is purely a hypothetical question, since they are operating at a loss, from what I can see:
http://www.redcross.org/images/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m1...
But let's suppose they had a surplus. Where does it go? They are limited in the uses they can put it to and still keep their nonprofit status. A regular for-profit corporation is not. So the Red Cross still has to cope with an added burden that it should not have to cope with (and would not have to in a sane world), and that added burden detracts from their ability to help people.
That's the limitation that's relevant to the name "non-profits"; there are several classes of tax-exempt non-profits, and that's the shared feature that makes them "non-profits" -- not that they don't have excess revenue over current expenses, but that they don't return profits to shareholders.
> So there is still an assumption that certain kinds of activities are "more worthwhile"
Well, yes, there are public resources being expended by way of a tax subsidy -- 501(c)(3)'s are not merely exempt from income taxes, but donations to them are tax deductible.
> Second, if there is an excess, what happens to the excess? Some of it probably gets put aside as a buffer for times when receipts are down. But other than that, what else does the Red Cross do with it?
All of it is put aside for future use.
> So the Red Cross still has to cope with an added burden that it should not have to cope with (and would not have to in a sane world), and that added burden detracts from their ability to help people.
Nothing stops you from forming a regular corporation and trying to do better than the Red Cross at what the Red Cross is intended to do. I suspect you'll find that the "burden" that you are talking about is far less than the benefit you would get from 501(c)(3) status. If that wasn't the case, no one would be starting 501(c)(3)'s.
But all of those different categories of tax-exempt entities have restrictions on the activities they can engage in and still retain their status, correct? So the limitation on activities is a relevant limitation for this discussion.
All of it is put aside for future use.
Doesn't that seem inefficient? Surely there are more profitable ways of using at least some of that excess than just putting it aside for a rainy day.
Nothing stops you from forming a regular corporation and trying to do better than the Red Cross at what the Red Cross is intended to do. I suspect you'll find that the "burden" that you are talking about is far less than the benefit you would get from 501(c)(3) status. If that wasn't the case, no one would be starting 501(c)(3)'s.
Of course; that's obvious. If we as a society choose to play favorites, obviously that skews the playing field. But skewing the playing field doesn't make the existing Red Cross more efficient; it just transfers the tax burden to the hypothetical corporate competitor. That's not an argument for making the Red Cross a nonprofit: it's an argument for doing away with the skewed playing field.
In other words, the relevant comparison is not between the existing Red Cross and a hypothetical corporate competitor in today's world; it's between the existing Red Cross and a hypothetical corporate competitor in a sane world where society does not play favorites by giving special benefits to certain types of activities. In that world, a corporate Red Cross that didn't have to restrict its activities to meet some arbitrary social requirement might do better at helping people than the existing Red Cross does.
I'm trying to reconcile the concept of a sane world with the concept of not having organized society "play favorites" and reward activities which are perceived to have social benefits.
The Tragedy of the Commons is not efficient.
You can reward activities that are perceived to have social benefits without playing favorites. People could still donate to the Red Cross if the donations were not tax deductible, and the Red Cross could still operate if there were no such thing as a tax-exempt organization.
Also, when you say "perceived to have social benefits", whose perception, exactly, are we talking about? If you argue (I'm not saying you specifically are, but many do) that we need to give special benefits to the Red Cross because otherwise they wouldn't get enough donations, you are basically saying that other people's perceptions of what activities have social benefits differ from yours, but since yours is obviously better, you are justified in skewing people's perceptions of social benefit by giving them tax breaks for donating to the Red Cross.
Even if we leave aside the question of what justifies skewing other people's perceptions, in a sane world, you wouldn't have to do it anyway. People's perceptions of the social benefits of various activities would be sane, i.e., reasonably accurate, so you wouldn't have to trick them into paying for things they otherwise would not pay for--more precisely, doing so would be a net loss to society.
(I'm not sure it isn't a net loss to society even in our actual world, because I think most organizations that take advantage of tax-exempt status are not doing things which are as obviously beneficial to society as the Red Cross. But that's a different discussion.)
>"That meets my definition of "profit", but apparently not yours. So we may be talking somewhat at cross purposes."
is that the same definition you used here?
>"It looks like Ovishinsky's corporation did make a profit, at least while he was running it. "
Profit is defined as total income minus expenditure. When talking about corporations, that is, by convention, the one unambiguous meaning in that context. But you now say that simply having income at all, is good enough to be considered "profitable". Huh!
You know it is very dishonest to just go around changing the meaning of words mid conversation, sir.
> In a sane world the Red Cross would be a normal corporation that was selling the service of helping people.
HELP ME! HELP ME I AM DYING.
RC: Sure thing. That will be $1200. Don't worry we'll send the bill to your family.
you know, like this sort of sane world?
House Burns Down While Firefighters Watch [1]
[1]: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/tennessee-family-home-b...
No, that's not what I said. I said people pay the Red Cross to do what it does: but the amount paid in must be at least as large as the amount spent by the Red Cross or they won't be able to continue doing what they're doing. The likelihood that, averaged over time, the amount they take in is exactly the amount they spend is miniscule. So practically speaking, they must be making a profit, in the sense of taking in more money than they spend, in order to continue functioning. (As I said, the fact that they are called a "nonprofit" is a subterfuge; they have to be making a profit in the sense of total income minus expenditure.)
You know it is very dishonest to just go around changing the meaning of words mid conversation, sir.
I did no such thing. I didn't spell out all of the above because I assumed you would be able to figure it out for yourself. Apparently I assumed wrong.
RC: Sure thing. That will be $1200. Don't worry we'll send the bill to your family.
So you missed the part where I explicitly said that people pay the Red Cross to help other people. The Red Cross does not charge the people they are actually helping. That would also be true in the hypothetical sane world I was describing: people would pay the Red Cross to help others. They just wouldn't have to lie about the Red Cross being a "nonprofit": the Red Cross could openly admit that it was taking in more money than it spent, and investing the difference in finding ways to help people better.
You know that it is very dishonest to put words in other people's mouths and accuse them of taking positions they have not taken, sir.
like this sort of sane world?
Was the local fire department a for-profit corporation? Or even a "nonprofit" like the Red Cross? Or was it, as I strongly suspect, a governmental entity? (The reason I strongly suspect that is that the city's mayor defended the fire department's action.) If it's the latter, then you are misrepresenting what happened to make it seem like it supports your position, when it actually does not. You know that it is very dishonest to do that, sir.
that's still not profit. That's breaking even.
> Was the local fire department a for-profit corporation?
A for-profit corporation. a privatised fire service. Because socialism is evil, supposedly, in this rural town, paying the fire fee is a voluntary choice, not an involuntary tax, and thus the fire service made sure nobody was going to die and then stood by and watched the house burn down. Because the family had opted not to pay the monthly subscription fee.
> So you missed the part where I explicitly said that people pay the Red Cross to help other people.
when what you wrote is right there and you haven't even bothered to edit it to fit this lie, saying something like this is a bit on the absurd side.
I'll put what you actually wrote, here again, for your own benefit.
> In a sane world the Red Cross would be a normal corporation that was selling the service of helping people.
and so
> You know that it is very dishonest to put words in other people's mouths and accuse them of taking positions they have not taken, sir.
It's dishonest to switch your positions at your convenience and make an accusation like that. It's stupid to do this when there's a visible record of you having done so.
OF COURSE you can say explicitly that you've changed your position, and that you've realised you were mistake in your view of the word "profit" but somehow I don't think this is going to happen.
You failed to quote the next two sentences: "The likelihood that, averaged over time, the amount they take in is exactly the amount they spend is miniscule. So practically speaking, they must be making a profit, in the sense of taking in more money than they spend, in order to continue functioning."
A for-profit corporation. a privatised fire service.
Reference, please? The article you linked to doesn't say this, and as I noted, it implies the opposite, since the city mayor defended the fire service. Also see below.
supposedly, in this rural town, paying the fire fee is a voluntary choice
"Supposedly"? Did you actually read the article you linked to? It says: "Residents in the city of South Fulton receive the service automatically, but it is not extended to those living in the greater county-wide area." In other words, the city (not town) only charges the fee to people living outside the city limits, who don't have the same expectation of receiving city services anyway.
I'll put what you actually wrote, here again, for your own benefit.
Sure, I'll even quote it again: "In a sane world the Red Cross would be a normal corporation that was selling the service of helping people."
Does that say "selling helping services to people"? No, it doesn't. It says "selling the service of helping people". By which I meant, as I clarified in subsequent posts, that people can pay the Red Cross to help other people, instead of helping those other people directly.
Was what I originally said ambiguous? Yes. But that means you ask for clarification; it does not mean you assume that I meant whatever is most convenient for you.
I just noticed this last sentence, and it's a valid point. I agree that profit does not always correlate with providing real value, and in fact day traders and investment banks provide a good example of how to spot when it doesn't. The key thing about the profits made by day traders and investment banks is that it comes from zero-sum trades: whatever they gain, someone else must lose.
That's not true of a profit-making activity like Ovishinsky's company; it made products that were of real value to people, and it got back some of that value as profits. In other words, the transaction was positive sum--both parties (the company and the customer) were better off as a result. (And of course the same is true of the Red Cross: the overall process of people donating to the Red Cross and the Red Cross using that money to help people is positive sum.)
This is an interesting statement, given that it doesn't sound like any of his inventions seem to be particularly focused on ending poverty in any direct way.
I read a lot of negative comments on Hacker News lately, including those posted as 'feedback' for things people have made and dared to post here, but also on articles where people are trying to spread some optimism and light amongst the typically depressing headlines we read every day.
So after reading this article, I of course clicked through to the comments hoping for some positive responses. Why? I don't know really, just because, you know, it might be nice to acknowledge the achievements of a man who dedicated his life to science, engineering and the betterment of society in general. It might be pleasant to, just once, instead of nitpicking, belittling, or demeaning the original poster or subject of the article, say something positive.
I briefly considered finding some evidence to demonstrate how much of a positive effect solar panels are having in developing countries (I'm fairly sure this is true). But then I decided not to, and just post something a bit more in the spirit of your original comment, a bit more thoughtless and petty.
If we were in a real life conversation, and someone brought up this genuinely interesting, game changing, benevolent gentlemen, and you responded in such a way, I think I would tell you that if you can't say something nice in such a situation, I suggest you don't say anything at all.
I find GP's comment personally relevant, because I would like to make a impact for good in the world... but what I'm working on doesn't directly relate to that. One resolution is faith that better technology eventually makes everything better. This seems historically true. But there's something more...
At first, Darwinism seems purely competitive, a fight for survival. But symbiosis exists, and there's even some evidence for integration of cooperative organisms (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrion#Origin). Axelrod's The Evolution of Cooperation investigates the obvious cause, that cooperation makes evolutionary sense when it benefits both parties (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Evolution_of_Cooperation).
What has this to do with a technologist indirectly addressing poverty? It seems to me that any technology that assists cooperation, or enhances its benefits, enhances the value of every human life. One natural outcome of providing more value is to receive more value in exchange, and thus reduce poverty. Another benefit is that it doesn't make sense to destroy your neighbour if he's benefiting you (this self-interest argument mightn't appeal to ethicists, but ethicists aren't the ones starting wars).
But there's a more direct route for Stanford. Providing options is another way to reduce poverty. He personally benefited from public libraries. Considering poverty in the third world, building public libraries might not be plausible. But what about small computers, perhaps with flat screens? Perhaps with rechargeable batteries and solar cells (so electricity infrastructure isn't necessary)? Might not this indirectly do more to alleviate poverty than any direct means available to him (or, indeed, to anyone)?
I think you're sincere in wanting a less nasty HN, but your comment isn't helping. It's part of the problem - "more thoughtless and petty" as you acknowledge. Partly it's because you interpreted GP's comment as mean-spirited, when it can be interpreted as objective, because it undermined your good feelings. In my opinion, the way to make things better is to find and act on what's better - in objective truth, not just personal feeling. (For this to be viable, you have to believe that objective truth will turn out to be good; i.e. that the universe is somehow "good". The symbiosis argument above convinces me.)
If you think my approach works better (in the preceding paragraphs), please copy it. If not, please show us a better way.
The point of my comment (in my own thinking) was not cynicism, nor even a disbelief of the impact his inventions would have on poverty, but an interest in the mechanics of the relationship between his inventiveness and his commitment to fight inequality and poverty. Perhaps he was incredibly far-sighted and visionary in being able to see how his inventions would have a significant impact on poverty in the long run, and it would be fascinating to see the intermediate steps he saw that would lead to that. Or maybe he thought his inventions would impact poverty in a trickle down way. Or maybe he simply had a sense of faith that if he invented as best he could, it would one day have an impact that even he couldn't imagine.
I would love to understand how best to join up inventive ideas with a commitment to end poverty and injustice. And I imagine Stanford Ovshinsky is a great model in that, but I felt like that one little statement from the original article left me hanging a little bit, and wanting more. I had hoped that the HN community could fill in with a few more ideas, or even details from Ovshinsky's life that would be further enlightening.
My apologies if I came across as disrespectful to a man who is clearly a hero and an inspiration - that was never my intention.
You comment is still basically unresponsive. Are we supposed to uncritically read everything we find on the web? Being critical is not the same as being negative, even if it's a feel good article.
@davedx: Thanks. More people should speak up about this sort of nonsense, cause it's really getting old...
This selective blindness isn't so surprising. Genius in one area does not imply genius in another.
Just because the majority of us here on HN are selfish, doesn't mean Stanford was! ;)
And Steinmetz blows this guy out of the water.
I will say that he has the proven ability to make awesome demonstration equipment for a materials science / electrochem class. Maybe a MOOC like Coursera or ed-x should draft him to teach an electrochem class or maybe materials science.
I.E he's an engineer.