MetaFilter posts tagged with benfranklin

And the Pursuit of Happiness

ericb — Sat, 01 Aug 2009 11:35:06 -0800

Maira Kalman (previously - 1 | 2 | 3) on Benjamin Franklin.

All About the Benjamins.

grapefruitmoon — Mon, 15 Jun 2009 14:39:19 -0800

Mark Wagner makes money into art.

... it does not follow thence, that they knew he gave light as soon as he rose.

Flunkie — Sun, 08 Mar 2009 09:55:57 -0800

Did you remember to set your clocks? No? Ben Franklin wants to wake you up by the sound of cannon fire in every street.

Those who would sacrifice liberty for security deserve neither

shoepal — Wed, 25 Jan 2006 12:46:54 -0800

Mr. Gonzales + Future Lawyers = ~~Crazy Delicious~~ Civil Disobedience

Ben Franklin's Electrical Experiments

yankeefog — Tue, 15 Feb 2005 06:07:07 -0800

I never was before engaged in any study that so totally engrossed my attention and my time Ben Frankin's extensive experiments with electricity went well beyond his famous kite flying; he also proved that lightning was electrical (and invented the lightning rod), and was the first one to use the words "positive" and "negative" to describe electrical charges. It would no doubt please the ingenious Mr. Franklin to know that all of his writings on electricity are now available online (Note: link goes to 912k PDF file.) Franklin's excitement over his discoveries is palpable--and high school students can duplicate them on their own, thanks to Ben Franklin As My Lab Partner. And for a demonstration that combines Ben's knowledge of electricity with his mischievous sense of humor and fondness for political subversion, watch Conspirators, or The Treason.

Final Frontier, the space between our ears.

troutfishing — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 07:39:11 -0800

A viilage to reinvent the world : Gaviotas "In 1965 Paulo Lugari was flying over the impoverished Llanos Orientales, the “eastern plains” that border Venezuela. The soil of the Llanos is tough and acidic, some of the worst in Colombia. Lugari mused that if people could live here they could live anywhere.....The following year Lugari and a group of scientists, artists, agronomists and engineers took the 15-hour journey along a tortuous route from Bogota to the Llanos Orientales to settle."

"...they would need to be very resourceful. So they invented wind turbines that convert mild breezes into energy, super-efficient pumps that tap previously inaccessible sources of water [powered by a child's playground seesaw!], and solar kettles that sterilize drinking water using the furious heat of the tropical sun....They even invented a rain forest!" (from "Gaviotas - A village to reinvent the World", by Tim Weisman) Amidst the strife of war torn Columbia, Gaviotas persists and even flourishes. " "When we import solutions from the US or Europe," said Lugari, founder of Gaviotas, "we also import their problems."....Over the years Gaviotas technicians have installed thousands of the windmills across Colombia....Since Gaviotas refuses to patent inventions, preferring to share them freely, the design has been copied from Central America to Chile."

Gaviotas is real, yes, but it is also a state of mind - as if Ben Franklin, Frank Lloyd Wright, Leonardo Da Vinci - all of the great those giants who reinvisioned the possible - were reincarnated : as a small Columbian village on a once-desolate plain. "Colombian novelist Gabriel Garcia Marquez has called Paolo Lugari the "inventor of the world." "