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Sir John Ambrose Fleming
(29 Nov 1849 - 18 Apr 1945)
English electrical engineer who was the inventor of the thermionic valve, the diode rectifier. He created the “Left Hand Rule” mnemonic for relating the directions of motion, current and magnetic field for a motor.
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Science Quotes by Sir John Ambrose Fleming (1 quote)
We are apt to consider that invention is the result of spontaneous action of some heavenborn genius, whose advent we must patiently wait for, but cannot artificially produce. It is unquestionable, however, that education, legal enactments, and general social conditions have a stupendous influence on the development of the originative faculty present in a nation and determine whether it shall be a fountain of new ideas or become simply a purchaser from others of ready-made inventions.
— Sir John Ambrose Fleming
Epigraph, without citation, in Roger Cullisin, Patents, Inventions and the Dynamics of Innovation: A Multidisciplinary Study (2007), ix.
See also:
- 29 Nov - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Fleming's birth.
- The Inventor of the Valve: a Biography of Sir Ambrose Fleming, by J.T. MacGregor. - book suggestion.
- Booklist for Ambrose Fleming.
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- 
