Edison and capital punishment – Ryan C

From the beginning, Thomas Edison had been a proponent of electricity. He was initially concerned about the safety of the public because he knew that if the public feared his electrical system, it would never be marketed successfully. He buried his electrical lines to ensure the safety of those on the streets, and since he was using DC current, the power through the lines was not substantial to be of real danger. However, once his reputation was established, and Westinghouse developed a more efficient and wider ranged system, Edison became more aggressive in his business tactics. He was no longer in danger of the public rising up against electric lighting, but he was in danger of having his business beat out by Westinghouse’s superior AC system. Therefore, he went on the offensive and became hostile towards Westinghouse. And although one would not doubt that Edison felt threatened by Westinghouse’s seemingly superior business, it was a conscious choice for him to attack AC current. This attack began before the issue of electrocution arose as the means of capital punishment. One would assume, therefore, that Edison’s support of electrocution with alternating current was just a continuation of his attack against that particular industry, and had nothing to do with improving the method of capital punishment. In addition, if his reputation had not been as renown as it was, the hearing would have made it painfully obvious that no one knew what electricity would do to a person. No one could know, because there were too many unknown factors, and no one had conducted extensive experiments on the human body and its resistivity to electricity. Edison, in true Edison fashion, was showboating his supposed expert knowledge on the subject, and in the end, it came back to bite him.

Edison’s Captial Punishment ~ Keith

I believe Edison’s position on the use of AC for Capital Punishment is completely unethical. Edison is using his credibility as “The Wizard of Menlo Park” to create an a large amount of FUD (Fear Uncertainty and Doubt) against Westinghouse’s superior AC system and its role in the electrocution of Humans. During this time period their was also a general lack of understanding electricity as it was a new Emerging technology. Although Edison might have been one of the most popular inventor, he was by no means a biologist who knew why and how electricity kills other then by observing its effects on lineworkers. Even during the trial, several key experts in the field all agreed that electricity was highly unpredictiable, lightning victems live to tell the tale, but still linemen working with much lower potential drop to their deaths if electrocuted. Edison took adavantage of his position and his creditiability to use Electricity as a form of execution, it is untested and fails miseriably during its first use.

Edison, Brown and Electrocution – Joey M

Brown had a very infuential role in Edison’s public relations campaign against the alternating current electrical system. They began with literature spreading the word of ACs dangers, but then moved on to demonstrations. They would use AC to electricute animals in the attempt to scare people into think it was dangerous.

I believe their campaign was unethical, but not just because they were killing animals to prove their point. The majority of our population has proven they do not believe that killing animals is not unethical as long as their deaths benefit society. For example, people eat meat all the time, which meant some animal had to die for that. I believe their campaign was unethical because they were only trying to show how AC was dangerous to promote their own business. They judged AC to quickly and instead of realizing its incredible potential, they exagerate its flaws just so they could get rich. Edison was a very smart person, and he easily could have realized that the dangers of AC could be controlled with further engineering.

12-Electric Nation

Mon, Oct 6th–in-class showing of Electric Nation.  Within two days of seeing the film, you are required to post a short response to the documentary.  After writing about what you learned from the film and what you thought of it, answer the following questions:  1) What larger question about electricity does the documentary address? 2) Why was the idea of a system so important in Edison’s electrification of NYC? 3) What was Samuel Insull’s vision for electricity and why did it go wrong?   4) What were Roosevelt’s policies during the Depression with regards to the electrification of America?  What argument did Wilkie make against Roosevent and the TVA? 

Edison the Man- Will

In the movie “Edison the Man”, Edison is depicted as a self- taught individual that always tried to improve things and never gave up even when things got tough. He is portrayed as a horrible father and husband that spends no time with his family because he is always in his laboratory. The way the movie looked, the readings about the loyalty Edison had with his family was correct. Many nights he stayed in Menlo Park, working non- stop. His children basically grew up without having a father figure in their lives. He was a man that kept to himself, which was proven by his avoidence of the press and authorities during critical points in the movie. Overall this movie depicted what we have already read and was very enjoyable.

Edison the Man – Robert

In the movie Edison The Man, Edison is shown to be a determined inventor who would try as many times as he had to in order to create something. However, his major inventions are created by accident or are found unexpectedly. He is also shown as a good father and husband who tried to avoid attention from the press. The version of Edison that Jill Jonnes shows in her book, however, is a much different person. In her book Edison is also a very determined and persistent inventor. However, he creates his major inventions by testing every possible solution until he finds the one that works. Also, Edison paid much more attention to his work than his family, who were ignored. The book also showed that  tried to get as much attention from the press as possible.

Edison the Man – Micah T.

In this movie Edison was portrayed as self-made man who pursued inventions to be able to keep all of the equipment that he and his team of men used to work on their projects.  Also he did not seem to be very methodical in the way he approached his inventions, in the movie he and his team seemed to stumble across their inventions.  He seemed more loyal to his family then many books about him say he was.  He was also portrayed as person that avoided taking the blame, as well as the press.  In many scenes he avoided the press by taking his famous cat naps.  In conclusion I enjoyed the movie overall, it was a fairly accurate  portrayal of Edison’s life.

Edison The Man- Rich M.

In the movie Edison the Man Thomas Edison is portrayed as a youthful and somewhat clueless inventor who seems to stumble into inventing as a result of his work with the telegraph companies. Though Edison did work for the telegraph company he had a passion for inventing practically applicable and financially successful gadgets. He is also portrayed to be much more family oriented than he was actually. In reality he was far more in love with his work than this movie showed. In addition to these falsies the movie portrays Edison to be a much more methodical man than he was. He tried things just to see if they work and didn’t jump to conclusions. He also was more scientific in his approach to the problems he tackled. Overall the Movie was interesting and shared a fairly accurate portrayal of Edison’s rise to success

Edison the Man – Joey M

After watching Edison the Man, we got a different portrayal of the kind of person Edison was. The movie portrayed Edison as a very homely, determined, a little bit clueless, and yet very intelligent person. In the movie there is a whole separate part about how Edison meets his wife and starts his family. There is only one part where Edison ignores his wife and family because he is too busy inventing. In the book, Edison is much more in love with his work than his family. We see that he is determined because even though everyone around him is telling him it is impossible to create a light bulb he still does not give up. However he is a kind of clueless in some ways in the movie. When he sold his first invention, he was expecting to sell for 2000 dollars. He was clueless to its real value, which was closer to 60,000 dollars. He did come across as very intelligent though when we got to see how he went about inventing things. 

Edison The Man – Michael

This film differs from Jill Jonnes’s version of Edison’s life in that the movie portrays him as a man who doesn’t like to draw attention to himself. The book says that Edison would voluntarily speak to the press whenever they asked. The film showed that Edison dislike talking to the press and would often hide while one of his friend or workers played his part. These are two completely different versions of his personality, but they both showed how rigorously he tested the different filaments for the light bulb. The film emphasized the time that it took for each filament to be tested, making Edison and his workers sit and wait on the filaments to burn out. While the book is more of a formal source of information, the film has lots of facts and incorporated a lot of humor as well. I personally feel that the movie was much more interesting and was a much more fun was to learn about Edison than reading 400 pages of a book that has no humor in it at all. The way the film was set up allowed more information to really sink in and was able to emphasisee how hard Edison really worked.