On Afghanistan's Thomas Edison

13.7BillionYears writes "The Institute for War and Peace Reporting details on the exploits of Ghulam Sediq Wardak, a 62 year old semi-literate Afghan with 341 clever inventions to his credit. His first was a radio powered by the low voltage produced by the human body. His most recent is a 1980 Volkswagen rigged to run on solar power. A handful of others are mentioned. Like many a Slashdotter, his parents were once very worried and he eschews patents. 'The main purpose of my inventing is not to earn money,' he says. 'I want to render a service to my countrymen and to all people in the world.'"

Comments

Geek, thy name is "Sediq"

[SYFer]

This man deserves some kind of geek homage. His picture (which I could not readily google up but would love to see) belongs on a Slashdot category icon. To "wardak" should be the expression to replace "jerry rig." If Futurama were still on, there would need to be a character named "Sediq." If we can invoke Kent Brockman here, we can honor this noble man.

I for one welcome our new clever, semi-literate Afghan overlord.

Interesting!

[Anonymous Coward]

Now, why can't this attitude be shared by more people? Really?

well

[abscondment]

"The main purpose of my inventing is not to earn money," he says. "I want to render a service to my countrymen and to all people in the world."

If he wanted to that more completely, he could have gone about patenting his inventions and through that legal ownership making them freely available for all to use. Maybe it would be nice if someone used the system against itself once in a while, eh?

Re:well

[Pharmboy]

No kidding. It's almost always the 'assignee' who causes all the trouble, not the 'inventor'. Problem is, it's pretty damn expensive to get a patent, at least in the US.

This is probably a good thing that it is expensive. If patents were as cheap as domain names (Patents as Cheap As $7.99 When You Register 25 or More!), we would have applications flooding the patent office, thus more patents on every stupid thing in the world. It would render the internet useless in a matter of a couple years. We would have patents applied for everything, pressing certain keyboard combinations, methods of posting to a site, and other garbage that would create so much noise, that by sheer odds you would see some of these get approved.

Some people (or corporations) would be submitting hundreds of similar patents, in the hopes that just a few will get approved, so they can start sending letters for royalties. If you think the IP/patent situation is bad now, just think about spam is cheaper than bulk mail, and you get the picture.

Signs of a true scientist...

[GillBates0]

But fame and riches have never been what motivated him.

"The main purpose of my inventing is not to earn money," he says. "I want to render a service to my countrymen and to all people in the world."

Sadly a rapidly diminishing breed nowadays, what with overwhelming patenting and copyright laws and abuse. Hats of to this guy.

Goal of the successful

[nuggz]

Notice how his goal isn't to make money.

The inventions are just things that happens along the way.

Clearly not like Edison

[hotspotbloc]

'The main purpose of my inventing is not to earn money,' he says. 'I want to render a service to my countrymen and to all people in the world.'"

Edison was notorious for jealously guarding his patents and squeezing them for every dollar he could. This man is a much better human being.

Re:Clearly not like Edison

[hotspotbloc]

But edisons invention were very groundbreaking

I completely agree. He can up with a wide range of inventions that made a very big difference in the world. He also was a shameless self promoter who did things like invent the "electric chair" solely to prove how "dangerous" his competitor's rival electrical standard (Nikola Tesla's AC) was compared to his DC.

Re:Clearly not like Edison

[Snad]

Eiiither way, the main point beeing is edison wasnt all that great of an inventor, more a very shrewd business man. Unless you are in business, and wish to learn more about how a ruthless business man should behave, edison isnt really someone you should be idolizing.

So what you're saying is that Edison was his generation's Bill Gates?

just think...

[Anonymous Coward]

just think what he could have done with a formal education

Edison? Patents? What?

[Asprin]

I might be hallucinating, but wasn't Edison (who invented AC generators, the phonograph and the motion picture camera/projector system) a patent hawk who did everything he could to extract money for every little invention he had a hand in creating? In fact, IIRC, that's why the motion picture industry set up shop in the (then) isolated desolation of Hollywood, California -- they wouldn't have to pay his exorbitant licensing fees out there.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like comparing this guy to Edison is like comparing Linus to Bill Gates.... in a comparative sort of way.

Thomas Edison? Sounds more like Ben Franklin

[Entropy2016]

From what I was taught, Franklin would invent something, then publish the design in his newspaper.
I'm not sure if Edison did that.

If Franklin did obtain patents, he obviously did so to ensure that nobody else would patent it first and keep the specs secret.

But which VeeDub?

[Buran]

I'm not sure what type of VW he's got, but given that he's in Afghanistan I wouldn't be surprised if it's not an air-cooled Type 1 (Beetle). But it could be a Type 2 (Transporter), too. Could even be a Golf -- it's the best-selling model they've got. We Americans are the only market that shuns it in favor of the Bora (Jetta) -- though I love my lil' white Golf IV!

I found a few more electric VWs with a little bit of looking:

Diesel-Electric (1.3L TDI) New Beetle

Electric 1969 Kharmann Ghia (the Ghia is a Beetle derivative)

Electric Rabbit (US Mk1 Golf)

And that's just for starters. VW AG itself considered a hybrid diesel-electric powertrain option for the Concept 1, which later became the New Beetle, but so far only the diesel portion has survived (the TDI is an option in the Golf, Beetle, Jetta, and now the Passat and the Touareg in the US, and in the rest of the model line elsewhere in the world.)

I'd love to see VW build a Golf-based CR-V competitor with a hybrid diesel-electric powertrain and the race-bred DSG transmission.

But yeah, this guy gets geek points from me. :)

Re:tall tales

[Gorobei]

One atmosphere of pressure is about 10 meters of water. You can't pump water any higher than that. I smell exaggeration.

Um, you can't suck water higher than 10 meters. How to you think water gets to the toilets on the top floor of a skyscraper?

Re:Amazing

[GoofyBoy]

>the fact that he has persisted with his tinkering in the midst of an Arab culture speaks of incredible curiosity, freethinking, and persistence.

And you think that the American legal and social system encourages tinkering? Ever read the DMCA (just to name on instance)?

Re:Amazing

[Lochin Rabbar]

The problem that Islamic countries in general have is not that they have stopped being inventive, but that strict prohibition of usury makes it difficult to create the kind of economy that we know in the west. Much of todays technological innovation requires big bucks to bring it to market, and it's hard to start up a technological firm without borrowing money.

Re:he should get patents, and here's why.

[Jamie Lokier]

so, tell me, what difference would there be in him patenting the stuff he does and then licensing them for free(which is what he would want to do) and not patenting at all?

By not patenting at all, other people can alter his inventions and patent those as new inventions - yes, citing his as prior art upon which they improved. Improvements are patentable, even minor ones. Those other people can then restrict the use of those alterations, charging license fees or even blocking all work along that line of improvement.

However, if he patented and licensed for free, then he could prevent other people from taking control of improvements of his inventions: he could force "derived inventions" to be just as free as his own (by analogy with derived works in copyright).

That's a huge difference. It's analagous to the difference between public domain and GPL, and the results might be just as significant. I don't know of anyone who's tried it yet.

-- Jamie

I dont believe the whole story.

[Technomancer]

The Philips Compact Cassette was introduced in 1965 http://history.acusd.edu/gen/recording/tape4.html
and was first shown 1963 and mass produced starting 1966 http://www.sony.net/Fun/SH/1-17/h1.html
Also, more here http://www.fact-index.com/c/co/compact_audio_casse tte.html

In 1964, when he was 22, a theft in his village inspired him to invent a burglar alarm that would also take a picture of the intruder.

His system involved surrounding a house with concealed wires that were attached to a battery, an audio cassette player and a camera. When the intruder stepped on the wire, it triggered the cassette player, which played a tape shouting, "There's a thief!". It also activated the camera, which would take a picture of the burglar.


So I dont believe he had an audio cassette player in 1964.

Also, he has to be very rich, outfitting his 1980 VW with solar panels,

120w solar panel costs like $500 or more. To power a car he needs lets say at least 10hp engine, so this is 7456.999 watt. lets say his electric engine is close to 100% efficient, so he will need only 62 panels * $500 = $31k.

the panels will need 62*1.425*0.652 = 57.6042 m^2 area which is about 7.5*7.5 meters or 22*22 feet for americans. good luck fitting this on any Volkswagen.

I SMELL BULLSHIT!