 |
5. Retell the text. 6. Read the following dialogue and make up your own to discuss the role of inventions and discoveries in different fields of science.
|
|
|
|
5. Retell the text.
6. Read the following dialogue and make up your own to discuss the role of inventions and discoveries in different fields of science.
Dialogue
Teacher: Todaywe are going to talk about the great people who changed the world around us. Who are you going to talk about, Mary?
Mary: I am going to talk about one great scientist who was underestimated by the scientific establishment and despite his breathtaking number of patents and discoveries his achievements were often underplayed during his lifetime.
Ivan: When did he live?
Mary: He was born in the second half of the 19th century (1856)and died in the first half of the 20th century (1943). He was one of the greatest and most enigmatic scientists who played a key role in the development of electromagnetism and other scientific discoveries of his time.
Lena: Where did he live?
Mary: It’s difficult to say. Being of Serbian nationality he was born in Smiljan, the Austrian Empire. Then he studied in Marburg in Slovenia and later enrolled in the Charles Ferdinand University in Prague. In 1880 he moved to Budapest where he worked for a telegraph company. In 1882, he moved to Paris, where he worked for the Continental Edison Company. In 1884 with a strong letter of recommendation, he went to the United States to work for the Edison Machine Works company. In 1891 he became an American citizen.
Nikolay: Wow, he had to move a lot. Did he get any awards or prizes for his inventions?
Mary: Unfortunately not. He invented and improved various devices used by the Edison Company but received no reward. This was one of several factors that led to a deep rivalry and bitterness between him and Thomas Edison. This deep rivalry was also seen as a reason why neither he or Edison was awarded a Nobel prize for their electrical discoveries.
Ivan: I have an idea who you are talking about. I think his name isNikola Tesla. I know that Tesla demonstrated the potential for wireless energy transfer and the capacity for AC power generation. Also the US patent office reversed his earlier patent for the radio, giving it instead to G. Marconi. He began a long, expensive and ultimately unsuccessful attempt to fight the decision. Marconi went on to win the Nobel Prize for physics in 1909.
Mary: Yes, you are right. This seemed to be a repeating theme in Tesla’s life: a great invention that he failed to personally profit from. Only after his death, in 1960 the General Conference on Weights and Measures named the SI unit of magnetic field strength the Tesla in his honor.
Teacher: Very often in the human history people became great only after their death. Thank you, Mary, for your remembering us about this brilliant and genius scientist.
On the base of https: //www. biographyonline. net/scientists/nikola-tesla. html
7. Read the text about another great scientist Thomas Edison and make a summary of the text in English.
Thomas Edison (1847 – 1931) was an American inventor and businessman who developed and made commercially available – many key inventions of modern life. His Edison Electric Company was a pioneering company for delivering DC electricity directly into people’s homes. He filed over 1, 000 patents for a variety of different inventions. Crucially, he used mass-produced techniques to make his inventions available at low cost to households across America. His most important inventions include the electric light bulb, the phonograph, the motion picture camera, an electric car and the electric power station.
|
|
|
Thomas Edison was born in Milan, Ohio on Feb 11, 1847, the youngest of seven siblings. His parents were middle class, though they were not wealthy. He attended only three months of formal schooling – he irritated his teachers with his repeated questioning and inability to just follow instructions. Unfortunately, from an early age, Edison developed a severe deafness, which ultimately left him almost 90% deaf. He would later refuse any medical treatment, saying it would be too difficult to retrain his thinking process. He seemed to take his deafness in his stride, and never saw it as a disability. He was largely disinterested at school and was mainly self-educated through reading. He took upon it himself to read every book on the library shelf. By the age of 12, he was reading Sir Isaac Newton’s famous work – Principia Mathematica. As a youngster, he tried various odd jobs to earn a living. This including selling candy, vegetables and newspapers.
Edison had a big break when he saved a young boy on the railway track from being struck by a runaway train. His grateful father, J. U. Mckenzie, had Edison trained as a telegraph operator and, aged 19, Edison moved to Louisville, Kentucky to work as a telegraph operator for Western Union.
From childhood, Edison loved to experiment, especially with chemicals. However Edison was undimmed and, despite scrapping by in impoverished conditions for the next few years, he was able to spend most of his time working on inventions. He received his first patent on June 1, 1869, for the stock ticker. This would later earn him a considerable sum.
By 1877, he had developed the phonograph (an early form of the gramophone player). This received widespread interest, and people were astonished at one of the first audio recording devices. This unique invention earned Edison the nickname ‘The Wizard of Menlo Park‘. Edison’s device would later be improved upon by others, but he made a big step in creating the first recording device.
With William Joseph Hammer, Edison started producing the electric light bulb, and it was a great commercial success. In 1878, he formed the Edison Electric light Company to profit from this invention. Edison successfully predicted that he could make electric light so cheap, it would soon come universal. His first power station was able to distribute DC current to 59 customers in lower Manhattan.
During World War One, Edison was asked to serve as a naval consultant, but Edison only wanted to work on defensive weapons. He was proud that he made no invention that could be used to kill. He maintained a strong belief in non-violence.
Edison made many important inventions and development in media. These included the Kinetoscope (or peephole view), the first motion pictures and improved photographic paper.
Throughout his life, he took an active interest in finding the optimal diet and believed a good diet could play a large role in improving health. He had six children, three from each marriage. Edison died of diabetes on October 18, 1931.
On the base ofwww. biographyonline. net
|
|
|
